#I PROMISE CHAPTER 40 IS COMING TOMORROW.

[delicatebarness]

the manuscript | chapter three

Summary: And, what about older men?

Warnings: Age Gap. (Dr Barnes: late 40s & Reader: early 20s)

Word Count: 1426

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A/N: Dick me dead, and bury me pregnant. Here is the link to the assignment mentioned in this chapter.- Please feel free to leave feedback or let me know where and how you want the story to continue, this is just as much yours as it is mine. - B

Tags: @mostlymarvelgirl | @mrsnikstan | @angelbabyyy99 | @kaithesimps-blog

The words of your assignment were still vivid in your mind as you hit ‘send’ on your email to Dr. Barnes. Laying your emotions out bare felt exhilarating, though terrifying. Something real, something raw had finally been tapped: The story of a young woman longing for the depth and experience of an older man, a mirror of your recent desires, and newfound feelings about unfulfilled connections with men your age.

Your thoughts had regularly returned to your meeting with Dr. Barnes, and the magnetic pull toward him– His intoxicating presence, full of authority and warmth that left you yearning. The way he leaned in, husky whispering, shivers shooting down your spine. You knew it was more than an academic connection, an unspoken attraction. 

While packing your bag after Psychology class, your phone buzzed with a new email notification. Your heart pounded as you unlocked the preview, Dr. Barnes had responded to your work. 

“Miss Spector, 

Your submission is captivating and shows significant growth. The raw honesty and ability to show vulnerability in your writing are truly commendable. I want to discuss your work further and help you delve further into these themes. Meet me in my office tomorrow at 3 PM.

I’m looking forward to our conversation, 

Dr. Barnes.” 

The prospect of another intimate encounter with Dr. Barnes caused a thrill of excitement and anxiety to course through you. His words penetrated your defenses, in both person and writing, reaching down to your core. Rereading the email, you could almost hear his deep, resonant voice, laced with praise. 

Zipping up your bag, you felt a tap on your shoulder. Slowly, you turned to become face-to-face with Wanda and MJ, two of your closest friends. They were both wearing mischievous smiles, curiosity twinkling in their eyes. 

“Hey, what’s got you grinning like The Cheshire Cat,” MJ teased, playfully nudging you. 

Wanda’s eyebrows raised suggestively as she joined in on the interrogation. “Yeah, spill, Spector! Pete up to his old tricks again?” 

Trying to find the right words, you chuckled nervously. “Oh, you two,” you jokingly rolled your eyes at them. “Nothing scandalous, just a text, I promise.” 

Your friends weren’t so easily convinced. Exchanging knowing glances as MJ leaned in closer, her voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper. “Come on, we’ve known each other for years. You can’t fool us that easy…”

Struggling to come up with an explanation, a blush crept up your cheeks. You tried to laugh off their teasing just as a familiar voice interrupted from behind. 

“Everything alright here, ladies?” Professor Wilson’s voice boomed across the empty lecture hall. Your heart skipped a beat, feeling the embarrassment heat your cheeks. You wondered how much of the conversation he had overheard.

Exchanging surprised glances, Wanda and Mj quickly composed themselves. Their once playful expressions shifted to innocent ones. 

“Oh… just chatting about our plans for the evening, Professor,” Wanda replied with a smile and casual tone. 

He nodded, leaving his gaze lingering on you for a moment longer. As he returned to his desk, you couldn’t shake the feeling that he knew more than he let on. 

Regaining your composure, you exchanged a relieved glance at Wanda and MJ, silently agreeing to table the conversation. Walking out of the hall, the weight of Dr. Barnes’ email hung heavy in your mind. Something had shifted, not only were you feeling the anticipation of the upcoming meeting with him, but you realized that your feelings for him ran deeper than you had allowed yourself to admit. 

Lost in your trace, you rounded a corner colliding with a solid figure. You stumbled back, slightly startled, however you felt a strong hand steadying you. Your heart began to race as you looked up, meeting the gaze of none other than Dr. Barnes himself. 

“Ah, Miss Spector,” he greeted, a smile beginning to play on his lips. His touch lingered against your skin, sending a jolt of electricity through you, igniting a subtle yet undeniable spark. 

“Dr. Barnes…” you trailed, trying to steady your racing heart. You heard the sniggering of Wanda and MJ as they watched in surprise and amusement. 

“My apologies,” Dr. Barnes said, his gaze dropping to your lips for a moment before returning to meet yours. “I hope I didn’t startle you too much.” 

Shaking your head, you felt a flush creep up to your cheeks. “No, not at all. It’s… I, un, I’m looking forward to our discussion tomorrow.” 

Your friends shared another glance at each other, a smirk tugging at their lips. They sensed your embarrassment, giggling and teasing you for being clumsy and oblivious. You shot them a quick warning look.

Dr. Barnes observed the interaction between you and your friends, his gaze lingering on you for a moment longer. “I’m glad to hear that,” he replied, his voice smooth. “I have no donut it will be a… fruitful conversation.” His voice was laced with a subtle undertone of invitation, a promise of something more lingering. 

You nodded, feeling a rush of heat spreading through you at his proximity. “Thank you, Dr. Barnes. I’ll see you tomorrow.” With one last glance into his piercing blue eyes, you excused yourself and followed your friends out of the building. 

As you walked away, Wanda and MJ’s laughter filled the air, you couldn’t resist another glance back inside the building. Standing in the same spot, was Dr. Barnes, his gaze fixed on you intensely. 

Time stood still as you locked eyes, a silent exchange passing between you. You had never experienced a connection like this before. 

You tore your gaze away at the sound of your name being called, joining your friends. But, Dr. Barnes’ stayed with you. 

~

He leaned back in his chair, his eyes studying you causing your pulse to quicken. “I’ve read your submission. It’s compelling and honest. You’ve done well, tapping into your fears… and desires.” 

Your palms warmed under his praise, and the thudding of your heartbeat drummed in your ears. “Thank you, Dr. Barnes. I tried to be as truthful as possible.” 

Nodding in agreement, he rested his chin against his fist. “That’s evident. Your exploration of the longing for an older man, their depth and experience was particularly poignant.” He paused, noticing you fidget with your fingers under his intense gaze. “Tell me, do you believe younger men are truly incapable of providing the satisfaction you seek?”

The question cut close to your personal life causing you to hesitate while searching for the right words. “I think… it’s not their age, but… their lack of understanding. They don’t seem to see beyond the physical.” 

“And, what about older men?” he pressed, shifting in his seat, leaning forward against his desk. “Do you think they inherently possess the ability to satisfy a woman on a deeper level?” 

“I think they have more life experience,” you replied carefully. “They tend to have more patience, more attuned to a woman’s needs.” 

The room seemed to close in around you as his eyes bore into yours. “Experience does bring a certain depth,” he murmured, his voice becoming lower, more intimate. “But, regardless of age, emotional connection and mutual understanding are paramount.” 

You nodded. “I agree. It’s about finding someone who truly sees and understands you.”

He smiled, a slow, almost predatory smile played on his lips, sending a heat to your core. His gaze pierced through layers of your defenses, you felt both exposed and exhilarated. “And how about you, Miss Spector? Do you feel seen?” 

Your breath caught in your throat, the pressure building up inside you making it hard to form words. “I… I think I’m beginning to.” 

His smile deepened, eyes gleaming with something darker. “Good,” he said, in a whisper. “It’s a rare and precious thing, true understanding… true connection. Keep exploring them, Miss Spector.” 

“Thank you, Dr. Barnes, I will,” you replied, your voice betraying you.

His eyes never left yours as he leaned back in his chair. The added sense of space allowed you to breathe, yet the electrifying connection between you was maintained. 

“I look forward to seeing where your explorations take you,” he continued, encouraging with a hint of command. “This is just the beginning, our journey together is only starting, and I’m here to guide you through it.” 

His eyes followed your every move as you stood to leave. “Until next time,” he said, glancing back at him, a hint of a smile played on his lips. 

“Until next time,” you echoed as you stepped out of his office and into the library.

---

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[the-name-is-z]

SKELETONS | masterlist

daryl dixon x f!oc series

ao3 link

Summary: After the apocalypse took everything Iris held dear, a new opportunity presents itself in the form of a bag of guns. Little does she know, that bag of guns starts something much bigger than she ever could have anticipated.

Warnings/Information: AMC's The Walking Dead OC Insert | 18+ Advised | strangers to lovers; the slowest of slow burns; gore; angst; horror; humour; m/f; more warnings for each chapter

Season 1

Chapter 1 - The Bag

Chapter 2 - The Deal

Chapter 3 - The Group

Chapter 4 - The CDC

Chapter 5 - Dr. Jenner

Chapter 6 - Time Runs Out

Season 2

Chapter 7 - Outlands

Chapter 8 - Manhunt

Chapter 9 - The Farm

Chapter 10 - At What Cost

Chapter 11 - Diving In

Chapter 12 - Easy Mistakes

Chapter 13 - Gunslinging

Chapter 14 - Out of the Frying Pan

Chapter 15 - Saviour

Chapter 16 - Recover

Chapter 17 - Calm

Chapter 18 - Execution

Chapter 19 - Rotten

Season 3

Chapter 20 - East

Chapter 21 - Little Things

Chapter 22 - Company

Chapter 23 - Bloodshed

Chapter 24 - Where Else

Chapter 25 - Loss

Chapter 26 - Found

Chapter 27 - Woodbury

Chapter 28 - Merle

Chapter 29 - New Arrivals

Chapter 30 - Clarity is Hard to Come By

Chapter 31 - Home Away

Chapter 32 - Old Friends

Chapter 33 - It Comes Around

Chapter 34 - Tombstones

Season 4

Chapter 35 - Risk

Chapter 36 - Too Close

Chapter 37 - Quarantined

Chapter 38 - No Smooth Sailing

Chapter 39 - Inhale, Exhale

Chapter 40 - Pieces

Chapter 41 - Bonding

Chapter 42 - Never

Chapter 43 - Partly Cloudy

Chapter 44 - Alone, Not Alone

Chapter 45 - Us and Them

Chapter 46 - Sunshine and Daisies

Season 5

Chapter 47 - Threats and Promises

Chapter 48 - Or High Water

Chapter 49 - Weary

Chapter 50 - Perception

Chapter 51 - Bound

Chapter 52 - Burned

Chapter 53 - Hostage

Chapter 54 - Cavalry

Chapter 55 - Days Gone Bye

Chapter 56 - Wanderers

Chapter 57 - Soul Searching

Chapter 58 - Resources

Chapter 59 - Go the Distance

Chapter 60 - Alexandria

Chapter 61 - Uniform

Chapter 62 - Worn In

Chapter 63 - Fate

Please standby for future posts! Hopefully I will get Season 6 up and running by December, but for now Skeletons will be on a short hiatus!

Season 6

Chapter 64 - Plans

Chapter 65 - Surviving

Chapter 66 - Wolves

Chapter 67 - Code

Chapter 68 - Heads Up

Chapter 69 - Defence

Chapter 70 - Walking

Chapter 71 - Strangers

Chapter 72 - Miracles

Chapter 73 - Pretty Rough

Chapter 74 - Disruption

Chapter 75 - Hilltop

Chapter 76 - Half

Chapter 77 - Not Tomorrow Yet

Chapter 78 - Dread

Chapter 79 - Unfinished

Chapter 80 - The Darkness Ahead

Chapter 81 - Last Day on Earth

[campbyler]

hiii everyone! just wanted to preemptively update you all that chapter 5 will probably be a couple of days late 😔✌️ i’m moving out of my current place next weekend so packing + the woes of a 40 hour work week and commute + a shorter than usual turnaround period between chapters 4 and 5 have made it a bit slower going than i would’ve liked and i would hate for you guys to wait all day tomorrow just for it to not be posted at all :( i’m currently aiming for it to be out sometime this weekend but i’m hesitant to give an exact day because 1. i hateeee rushing my writing and would always rather take a little extra time to make sure i post something i’m happy with and proud of and 2. life happens so on and so forth etc etc etc and you never really know! it will be out Soon though. i Promise. thank you for your patience! you all were rockstars with the ch4 wait and i hope i can deliver when ch5 does come out 🤸🫡

[otdiaftg]

The King's Men - Chapter Three

Day: Thursday, January 4th Time: 7:40 PM EST

Wymack pounded on the wall, calling a pause to the scrimmage, as Neil headed for the door. Neil let himself onto the court and headed for the goal. Andrew slung his racquet across his shoulders at Neil's approach. Neil knew better than to call Andrew out with an audience, so he stopped as close to Andrew as he could and kept his voice down. "Coach wants to know what you have against the offense line." Andrew slid a look past Neil to the court wall. "He can ask me himself." "Or you can answer me since I'm already here," Neil said. "There are only nine of us left. If we lose anyone else we're out of spring championships. You know that." Neil waited a beat, but of course that wasn't enough to get a reaction. Andrew looked bored of this conversation already. Neil put a hand up in front of Andrew's face, neatly blocking his view of Wymack, and waited until Andrew looked at him again. "I want us to get to finals. I want us to be the ones who finally bring the Ravens down. After everything Riko's done to us, don't you want that, too?" "You say 'want' so freely," Andrew said, "when I have told you a thousand times before I want nothing." "Probably because you're spending all your energy on not wanting anything," Neil shot back. "But if you can't grasp that simple concept, I'll put this in terms you do understand: this is a game we can't afford to lose. This is how we get to Riko. This is the only thing we can take from him that will actually hurt. Let's rip his rank out of his fingers and show him he had a reason to fear us all along." "Do your teammates still think you're the quiet one?" Andrew asked. "Our teammates," Neil said, with emphasis, "want this as much as I do. Stop cutting them off at the knees before they have the chance to try." "I don't believe in giving people chances." "I didn't until I came here," Neil said. "I took a chance on you when I decided to stay. You took a chance on me when you trusted me with Kevin. Is it really that hard to support them when they've been with you every step of the way?" "What will you give me in exchange for my cooperation?" Andrew asked. "Because revenge isn't good enough?" Neil asked. "What would it take?" Andrew didn't have to think about it. "Show me your scars." It was not what Neil was expecting, which was probably why Andrew asked for it. Neil opened his mouth to protest, but the words died in his throat. Wymack and Abby had already seen them, and the Foxes knew they were there. He'd put Andrew's hand to his ruined skin back in November to earn Andrew's trust. Neil had promised Andrew the missing parts of his truth if they survived the year. He hadn't thought Andrew would settle for a visual. "When?" he said at last. "We are going to Columbia tomorrow," Andrew said. "Now walk away and tell Coach to mind his pay grade. I will not let him get away with this a second time." Neil didn't understand, but he nodded and left.

Art used with permission by llstarvasterll. Thank you @llstarcasterll !

[builtaworldwithyourlove]

I Forget Where We Were

1.6k/joel miller x f!reader / MINORS DNI 

summary: life with Joel from the start. Be kind please- this is my first piece and has taken 6 months of courage🤍

Chapter Ten: All Is Now Harmed

My fear in lights, all I said comes home. I can’t do this alone. 

what to expect: the steps towards the next stage of life. 

warnings: bad language i guess idk?😂fluff, dad!joel,lover boy joel, no specific physical description of reader, female reader (please let me know if there is anything I’m missing, I will elaborate as the series goes on) no outbreak, age gap (reader is mid 20s and Joel is mid 40s), boyfriend!joel? i repeat boyfriend!joel, kitten antics, house renovations and surprises

    · · ────── ·𖥸· ────── · ·

The week passed in the blink of an eye, with great news at work that you were given a payrise and a shining personal review.

It was tradition that you and Laura had a Friday night cocktail to unwind after the week. She was brighter and happier this week, and Tommy was treating her beautifully, just like she deserved. You had told her your apartment had sold. You had a cash buyer, meaning you completed within the week and now had a lump sum in your account. 

‘Drinks are on you then?’ Laura laughed, ‘first a pay rise and now enough to buy a few birkins with change’

‘Girl don’t even start, I’ll be poor by next week if you tempt me. No birkins just yet, one day though I promise.’ you tapped your cocktail glasses together and offered to drop Laura home. She said Tommy was picking her up for date night.

‘Cute, you guys make me sick’ you cuddled Laura good bye and said she can pop by tomorrow at yours to help you sort your apartment out ready to move in with Joel.

   · · ────── ·𖥸· ────── · ·

You picked up your usual wine and pizza, some groceries for the weekend and a bunch of peonies to bring home. 

Tommy walked out the front door, covered in sawdust and sweating.

‘Don’t ask’ he said. 

‘Laura’s waiting for you’ he looked like he had seen a ghost and sprinted like road runner to his van. 

The hall was littered with tools, timber and Ikea boxes. 

‘I’m home baby’ you called. Nova came running through the hall, her collar jingling through. You picked her up and held her as you both searched for Joel. 

‘Damn cat has been climbing my sunflowers’ Joel sipped his beer and pointed a finger accusingly at Nova.

You fake gasped and covered her ears. ‘Watch your tone around the baby. What’s going on in the hallway?’

Joel rolled his eyes and carried on keeping busy round the garden. ‘Couldn’t keep building material’s at the client’s house’

‘Where’s Sarah?’ You shouted, as he turned his back and carried on walking.

‘At a friend’s, sleeping over. Birthday party tomorrow.’

You hummed and went back inside with Nova. 

Dinner was cooking and you caught up on your shows, with the kitten snuggled up on your lap.

Joel came in and sat in the armchair opposite you. 

‘There’s room for a little one.’

‘I’m hot. Been working all damn day and just had to tidy the garden’ Joel huffed.

‘Well you didn’t have to tidy the garden, it could’ve waited for tomorrow’ you tried to reason with Joel and his woe is me situation.

He didn’t respond. 

‘The money came in from the buyer’s today. I was thinking we’ll get some bits done and could book a little holiday, us 3. Tommy and Laura too?’ You picked up Nova, still catching z’s, and went and sat on Joel’s lap.

‘I’d love that baby. I’m exhausted, we need a break’ Joel rested his head on your shoulder.

‘I know baby. Thank you for everything you’ve done’ you cuddled him close.

   · · ────── ·𖥸· ────── · ·

It was bed time, and you were both showered and snuggled up watching Desperate Housewives. 

‘Laura is meeting me back at the apartment for 11am tomorrow. Got a shit ton of stuff to do’ Nova was nestled between you& Joel. 

‘Sounds good baby. Me& Tommy have some bits to do, but we’ll bring some drink and get stuff done’ Joel looked at you over the rim of the glasses that sat on his nose.

‘I look forward to it.’ You removed his glasses and got up to put Nova in her cat bed. She now has one in every room. You pulled the duvet off Joel. ‘Now get naked, Mr Miller’

    · · ────── ·𖥸· ────── · ·

It wasn’t clear why Tommy and Joel were like this, but you were woken up at 6:30am by the sound of power tools and country music.

‘What the fuck is going on?’ Nova was sat at the foot of the bed, with a head tilt and a baby meow.

You called Joel on the phone, knowing you wouldn’t be heard if you shouted.

‘Sorry baby, we’re just organising the loft. Won’t be long. Coffee would be nice’ Joel sounded as if he had just run a marathon.

‘Sure coffee would be nice, god damn asshole’ you muttered to yourself ‘ so would being able to sleep in til 8.’

You went downstairs and made breakfast for the boys and left some coffee on the landing for them.

You were still in a sleepy daze, you failed to notice the hallway had been emptied of building materials.

Tommy bounded downstairs and swung round the banister launching himself into the kitchen. Joel followed quickly behind, slurping his coffee. They were both happy and chirpy, until they saw you sat in the garden in the patio chair listening to Lana Del Rey with eyes shut.

‘Shit, that’s her man-hating music’ Joel whispered.

‘Boy I’m out of here then. I’ve already pissed one chick off by waking her up to leave early this morning, I’m not facing the wrath of your one too’ Tommy ate his bacon sandwich and got ready to leave.

‘Thank you brother. I appreciate you’ Joel hugged his brother and smacked him on the back.

‘She’ll love it. See you lunchtime at the old house. Bring your marigolds’ Tommy left and Joel approached you in the garden.

‘Baby?’ Joel was terrified. If he knew one thing, it was do not wake a sleeping girlfriend.

‘How can I help?’ You sighed.

‘I love you’ Joel knew laying it on thick would melt you.

‘Asshole’ you sat on his lap, and Joel stroked your thigh under your robe and played with the hem of your night dress.

‘Gym?’

‘Let’s go, Mr Miller.’

   · · ────── ·𖥸· ────── · ·

Your workout was finished, and you and Joel showered and headed back to yours. Laura and Tommy were parked up waiting for you.

‘Can you guys go pick up some trash bags and moving boxes?’ The boys nodded as though ready for a military operation. 

‘Let’s get started.’

   · · ────── ·𖥸· ────── · ·

It was now 4pm, and all your stuff had either been packed up, taking to charity, or put on eBay. 

‘Dinner?’ you were all exhausted, and food was a welcomed idea from Tommy.

You headed down to the local grill and had dinner and drinks before getting home. 

The movers were coming tomorrow, so Tommy agreed to have Sarah overnight so you and Joel could sort things out tomorrow.

    · · ────── ·𖥸· ────── · ·

When you got home, you got a glass of wine for you& Joel and ran him a bath. He was now converted since joining you that night.

You were sat on the sofa half watching a film and half internet shopping.

‘Don’t spend it all at once’ Joel crept up behind you and held your shoulders to make you jump.

‘Bastard,you’re not getting anything now’

‘Can I show you something?’ Joel grabbed your hand and lead you to the stairs up to the third floor. This was Joel’s loft, but he said it was just storage and not worth seeing.

He uncovered your eyes and revealed the renovation him and Tommy had been working on.

A bespoke closet, work from home space and dressing room ready for you to move you stuff into.

You couldn’t believe your eyes.

‘Well I feel incredibly guilty for moaning at you both this morning’ you laughed through a sniffle and Joel wiped your tears of joy, ‘Thank you, baby.’

‘I’m so grateful to have you here. I love you more than life, and you deserve it’ Joel squeezed you tight.

‘I can’t wait for the rest of my life with you.’

    · · ────── ·𖥸· ────── · ·

The next morning, you had to head back to the apartment and let the movers in. Thankfully, you didn’t have to bring any furniture except the sofa, as Joel had decided they were prettier and comfier than his, and you just had a few boxes of bits and pieces, plus your all of your clothes.

‘I’m on my way back baby, movers finished all smoothly’ you called Joel through your car speaker.

‘Okay darling, just picking Sarah up and then will see you at home.’

Sarah and Joel pulled up home at the same time as you& the mover’s. Sarah couldn’t believe the surprise of a kitten and her new bestfriend moving in within the same week.

‘This will take about an hour, do you want to help me decorate the loft?’ Sarah saw the opportunity to raid your wardrobe and ran with it. 

Joel went and got you both a drink and some snacks whilst he sat and watched you both put the last of your clothes in the wardrobe, and put your candles around the room.

‘Well doesn’t this look beautiful? Who’d have thought we’d make yourself so girly?’ you high fived Sarah and cuddle Joel.

‘Thank you for doing this for me. I love you both so much. I feel blessed to live my life with the Millers’ Nova ran up the stairs and joined the family meeting.

‘All that’s left to do is give you a new surname, can’t have the cat as a Miller and not you officially’ Joel winked.

Now you had an an engagement to think about, as if you couldn’t be any more spoiled.

Previous Chapter

[firstdegreefangirl]

Chenford + 40. “I’m gonna carry you to bed if you keep arguing with me about not needing sleep.”

"It's fine, Tim. I'm fine." Lucy looks up and blinks several times before she focuses on his face.

"I never said you weren't. But it's 1:30 in the morning, and you haven't let that couch since dinner."

"I have so!"

"Getting up for coffee at 9 p.m. doesn't count."

"There's only like 200 pages left. I'm over halfway; I'll come to bed when I finish."

"Lucy. That's the entire book. In one night."

"It's really good."

"And it will be really good tomorrow too."

Lucy flips a few pages ahead. "Fine. I'll just finish this chapter."

"Fine." Tim takes a couple steps closer. "Sit up."

"What?"

"Sit up. I'll sit with you, and we'll go to bed together."

"I don't need a babysitter."

"I know. But our bed is better with you in it." Lucy's expression softens as she leans forward enough for him to slide in behind her. He wraps an arm around her chest as she settles back into his side and picks her book up from her lap.

It's not even two pages later that Tim is making good on his promise. The book drops back to Lucy's chest and her breathing evens out. Tim takes it gently and slides a receipt from the coffee table between the pages.

He carries Lucy down the hall, tucked against his chest. After he lays her down, he pulls her socks off, knowing she'll whine about her feet being too warm if they stay on all night. When he climbs into bed beside her, pulling the covers over them both, she shifts around until her body is pressed back against his.

Again, he wraps am arm around her torso, pulling her close. His eyes are already drooping, but he finds the top of her head anyway, pressing his face into her hair and dropping a kiss there.

She's going to complain in the morning, he's sure, but he stands by what he said earlier.

The book will still be there.

[sharkscribbled]

Chapter One: The QuikPump Deal

(i promise ill format this better later lmao i just don’t know how to make it pretty rn)

content: pet whump, dehumanization, guard dog whump, mention of gun violence

—

Daphne never really noticed it before, but she got a lot of mail. Like, an unneeded amount of mail. Which made sorting through four days of it particularly tedious.

She didn’t regret going to a cabin with Florence, of course. It was long overdue; despite dating for three years they’d never actually been on a vacation together. Of course, they had days off from their jobs that lined up—Florence worked from home as a transcriptionist for television shows, so she was always at the house anyway. But Daphne was a pediatric nurse at a local hospital, so there were rarely breaks in her own schedule.

The news was mostly uninteresting as usual, but she still always felt the need to skim through it. At the bottom, there were a bunch of little ads for jobs and whatnot. Something in particular caught her eye. It looked hastily put together, like it was a last minute thought.

Home needed for guard dog. Former pet at King Mateo’s palace. Male, 28. Euthanasia date: April 30th.

A phone number was attached. Her brow furrowed. The ad was short and uncomfortably vague. And clearly, they weren’t talking about an actual dog.

King Mateo’s palace was also about 40 miles away. It was weird for there to be an ad all the way in the town of Dewbury. Furthermore, the neighboring state had no monarchy anymore, so to call it a “palace” was… a bit of a stretch. The closest thing to it was the fact that some of the family had a hand in politics.

She glanced at the calendar on the fridge. The day marked “get home” was April 29th.

Daphne felt something in her chest draw tight. Thoughts began to rush through her head. How would they kill that guard dog? A bullet to the heart, or between the eyes? Would he die scared, or resigned, or happy that he’s being good? Would anyone miss him?

She bit the inside of her cheek and glanced around the house, imagining the rooms she couldn’t see. It was a medium-sized little bungalow, with lots of personalised clutter. Florence often saw rugs on sale at their local discount store and bought them without thinking, layering them in the living room one on top of another. They went heavy on the browns as far as painting went, and there wasn’t a surface in the house without plants. There was a guest bedroom that was used by Florence as an office and by both of them as a storage room.

It’d be a bit tight sometimes, but it was better than being dead, wasn’t it?

She blinked the thought away. “Hey, Florence?” She said, turning her head towards the living room where Florence was idly scrolling her phone. “Can you come look at this?”

Florence nodded, tossing her phone on the couch as she rose to her feet. “Wha’?” She said, waltzing over to the table.

“This ad. Can you look at it?” She asked, handing the paper to her. She didn’t know what she was trying to get from this—maybe she hoped that Florence would have the same disturbed reaction that she did.

Florence put the paper close to her face and squinted as she read. She pulled it away and sat it back down on the table.

“That’s tomorrow, isn’t it?” She asked, glancing at the calendar same as Daphne had. “That sucks.”

“Yeah.” Daphne picked up the paper just for something to do with her hands, her voice slow. “I mean, you’ve seen those videos where people like, reform pets.” The word pets left a bad taste on her tongue.

Florence tapped her fingers against the table thoughtfully. “Yea. We could fix up that guest bedroom real nice. Y’know… indefinitely.”

“Indefinitely.” She echoed. “Yeah.”

And so Daphne ended up dialing. A disinterested masculine voice told her to call about an hour in advance, but to be at a QuikPump somewhere in the middle before 5 tomorrow because that’s all the time the poor mutt has left. She briskly agreed and put the phone down.

She and Florence didn’t talk much more that night. There wasn’t much to say.

—

The next day, at around 4:25, Daphne pulled out of the driveway. Florence was in the back where he would also be, not wanting to create some kind of weird power dynamic right off the bat. Florence always thought of things like that.

It only took 30 minutes to get there. The gas station had only a couple of people, but they all seemed to be engaging in equally sketchy deals. It was strange to Florence how what they were about to do was arguably worse than whatever the other people outside the QuikPump were doing, but that this was completely legal.

Another car pulled up beside them. Florence opened her door, pushing her thumbs into her belt loops and standing by the dilapidated gas pump.

A man got out of the car, with wispy brown hair and sunken eyes. He opened the backseat and grabbed something roughly.

No, someone. There, dragged out by the shirt, was the guard dog. He had a white shirt and plain black shorts, barefoot against the pavement. There was a thick blindfold around his eyes and a muzzle strapped over his mouth.

Her first thought, to her own shame, was that he didn’t look like a person.

“Bit small for a guard dog.” She commented, trying to keep up the nonchalant buyer act. Truthfully, he seemed average-sized at about 5’7. Hopefully he wasn’t insecure about his height or anything.

“That’s not what it does.” The man shook his head, grinning cockily. “It’s a werewolf. Has some rare gene of it, too. It can transform whenever it wants and keep its mind.”

She narrowed her eyes, hiding the spike of fear in her chest. A werewolf? And no one had mentioned that before?

“So why were you gonna euthanize h- it?” She asked. “If it’s so special, I mean.”

“Incompetent little mutt got shot.” The man shook his head. “Bullet’s still in its shoulder. Right arm don’t work quite right. Docs said it was some nerve ending that got fucked up. If you want it to recover, it’s gonna be out of commission for a while.”

Florence looked at the man’s right arm. It hung limp at his sides. The bullet wound must’ve been under his t-shirt.

“Okay.” She hid her uncertainty with a calm nod, putting her hand on the man’s shoulder and opening the car door wider, sitting him down carefully. The other man got into his car and it seemed to be over. She got in on the other side of the backseat, awkwardly buckling him and then herself in.

“Hey buddy.” She said softly as Daphne started to pull out, immediately feeling a weird pit in her stomach from talking to an adult like this. “Hey, let me get this muzzle off, okay? Just lean your head forward a little…”

He did as she asked, so at least he could hear. She was able to unclip it easily, taking it gently off his face and setting it aside.

It left deep red marks. She looked at them carefully, then it dawned on her. Silver. She had to steady herself before she took the blindfold off.

He had carefully blank green eyes. Green eyes were pretty rare and it made her wonder what the odds were of two people—him and Daphne—in the same car having them. His hair was so dark brown it could almost be black, a bit long and wispy around his neck and ears. Scars ran over every spot on his body that she could see. She didn’t want to think about it.

“Hey.” She said again. “Can you talk? You have permission to.”

From what she had heard, he would probably want permission for a lot of things. She hoped to wean him off this.

“Yea.” He said softly, his voice rough. “I can speak.”

Florence tried to grin reassuringly. “Great, that’s good. Okay.” She paused. “Do you have a name?”

He looked at her with that same sort of mindless obedience. “No.” He said. “If you want me to have one, it’d be an honor to be named.”

Yikes, she thought, but instead she said “How about Arlo?”

[draguta]

.a court of ash and smoke | two.

pairing: lucien vanseera x fem!reader

summary: five years before feyre archeron ever stepped foot in prythian, another human girl found herself in the spring court. but the trials and tribulations of her time under the mountain left her with nothing but a certain red-headed high fae emissary, who had once resented her entire presence, to help and guide her.

chapter warnings: **MAJOR WARNINGS: SUICIDE, SUICIDAL THOUGHTS ** non-con, dub-con, violence

chapter word count: 5237

a/n: I'm posting this a little earlier than intended (was aiming for a new chapter every 2 days) because I've apparently got a scheduled power cut tomorrow (in 40 degree heat - send me prayers). Enjoy folks!

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please remember to reblog, like, and share a comment if you enjoy this series - it is always appreciated by writers to see their hard work valued.

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Ash Arrow

The first man from Amarantha’s court to grace your bed - the first man you had ever taken to bed - was not gentle. He had hit you so hard that your cheekbone bruised, and even your new High Fae strength was nothing compared to these centuries-old Fae. He had delighted in realising that you had bled shortly afterward, and had made quite the spectacle in telling everyone exactly how he had taken your virtue.

After around two dozen men had come and gone from your chambers, and weeks had passed by, you came to learn what it was that you had to do. They would come, take what they wanted, and leave nothing in return. They didn’t want anything sensual or passionate, there was no kissing or foreplay, they simply wanted to bury themselves for an hour or so, and you were the chosen place to do it.

By the next time Lucien had come to visit, you had become quite adept at pretending to be somewhere else, and the dark shapes behind your eyelids became your best friends, come to you every time a knock came at your chamber door and you closed your eyes, praying that it would be over soon.

It had been three months since Lucien’s initial visit, and this time he found you, not in that dank cell, but in the throne room. A High Fae from Hewn City had you sprawled in his lap whilst he swallowed down glass after glass of wine, his hand resting on your upper thigh - you were his property for the night, and damn anyone who might try to touch you.

“Give us a smile then,” the High Fae growled, looking you over. His friends chuckled low and dark. You didn’t speak, and you wouldn’t dare to, instead simply pulling at the sides of your lips until they resembled something close to a smile. You hadn’t smiled in months. You had very little to be joyful about down here under this mountain.

“Y/N?” Your name came as a whisper somewhere behind you, and you tensed at the voice, turning to find the youngest brother of the Autumn Court staring back at you in pure shock. “What are you doing?”

His face had gone deathly pale - as pale as a corpse - and his eyes were narrowed, lips a thin, straight line. The Fae who was currently providing your seat scoffed, glancing at his friends and then back at Lucien with a snarl. “Wait your own turn, Autumn. Unless you want to lose that other eye too.”

Lucien flinched ever-so-slightly, but didn’t make to reply. Instead, he turned back to you, leaning forward slightly. “I have business to attend to, but I’ll find you shortly, ok?”

You nodded, and watched as he hesitantly turned, almost as if he didn’t want to leave you with the Hewn City Fae, and slipped into the crowd.  You fought the urge to scream after him for him to take you with him, wherever it was he was going. That wouldn’t go down well with the Fae who’s lap I sat in, and definitely not with Amarantha.

He did keep his promise, however. Shortly after the Hewn City High Fae left your chambers, the soft knock sounded on my door, and you braced yourself for yet another client - you usually only had one per night, but sometimes another would sneak in during the late hours when the throne room party was dying down. However, when the door swung open, it wasn’t a client, but rather the red-headed emissary of the Spring Court.

He entered the room slowly and hesitantly, coming to a stop at the foot of the bed, just as he had done on your first day in the Spring Court. He averted his gaze when he realised that you weren’t properly covered, an issue that you fixed by wrapping the sheets around your chest.

“What are you doing?” He all-but snapped. You hadn’t been expecting to see the anger behind his eyes, nor for it to be directed at you. “What the fuck is this game you’re playing?”

“I’m doing what I need to do to survive,” you countered, echoing Rhysand’s words. “This was the only way.”

“No,” he snarled. “There were plenty of other ways to get out of that cell other than whoring yourself out to the entire court. We were-”

You let the bitter laugh that ruminated from the pit of your chest cut him off, glaring at him as you sat up and faced him, hand still holding those sheets over your naked form. “Perhaps you had a plan,” you snapped. “Maybe you would have found a way out for me. But it’s been three months, Lucien. Three months since you last came, and for all I knew, you were going to leave me down there. You were never going to come back!”

“You think that I would leave you there?” He hissed through gritted teeth. He glanced away again as you rose from the bed and threw a silk nightdress over your body, and you knew even as he glanced back and winced that it still wasn’t enough to properly cover you, the thin, light material practically see-through, and showing the entire length of your legs.

“I don’t know what you would do, Lucien,” I snapped back. “It’s not as if you didn’t make it perfectly clear during those months at the Spring Court that you would rather me gone. Perhaps leaving me here was your plan all along, to get me out of your way so that I didn’t bother you anymore.”

“Y/N,” he growled, and you could help but take a step back from him. That fire burning behind his eye was brighter than you had ever seen it before, stronger and harsher. He was furious with you, and you didn’t like to think what that entailed. “Did I not tell you that I would come here whenever I could?”

He moved to perch on the edge of the bed, fists clenched to white knuckles, frowning once he realised the act that had just been committed between those sheets, but he ignored it, and kept that firm stare on you. “When I told Tamlin that you were going to stay here, he was enraged. He trashed half of the house.” He let out a low and heavy sigh. “What do you think is going to happen when I tell him that you’re whoring yourself out to Amarantha’s entire court?”

“Right now, what Tamlin does is not my concern,” you muttered, moving to sit at the vanity, watching him through the reflection in the mirror. “I need to focus on surviving, on living.”

“You would call this living?” He countered, running a hand over the silk sheets of the bed. “Don’t you see that you are playing entirely into Amarantha’s hand? She wants to spoil you, wants to keep Tamlin angry, to tease and torment him, because she thinks that you are his lover.”

You paused, spinning in your seat to stare at him, mouth slightly agape. Suddenly, everything made sense. Everything that Amarantha had done became clear to you. She was using you to try and torture Tamlin, and this was simply another step in her plan. To see his lover be whored out to her court and know that he was powerless to stop it. Only, you weren’t his lover, and she had made a mistake. You were stuck there because of a mistake. Your stomach swirled in anger.

“But Rhysand said this was the only way,” you whispered, tears beginning to well in your eyes. “He said that this was the only way I could survive.”

“Rhysand told you that?” Lucien scoffed. “Surely you should have realised that Rhysand is Amarantha’s lap-dog. Anything that he says is only ever to benefit himself, or her. You can’t trust him.”

Your shoulders began to shake, just slightly, as the sobs wracked through your body one by one, waves of anger and sadness and frustration and mourning for what could have been, the life you could have lived at the Spring Court, washing over you inch by inch. You weren’t sure when you fell to the ground, when you crumpled onto your knees and began to weep, yet, to your surprise, two strong arms wrapped themselves around you, grounded you and comforted me. It was overwhelming, the information that he had given you was too much. You had gone through all of this simply because Amarantha had wanted to destroy Tamlin, and had thought that you - his supposed lover - was the best way to break him.

“It will be ok,” Lucien whispered soothingly, and you were too wrecked to even spare an ounce of surprise at his kindness. “I’ll come more often, I promise.”

“I’m a fool,” you choked out between sobs.

“Well, as much as I’m inclined to agree,” he smirked. “In this instance, I don’t think so. If you say this was the best way to keep you alive, then I believe you.”

You sniffled, wiping your nose on the back of your hand, and looked up at him. He was smiling - a real, shining smile that seemed to leech through the darkness and coldness of the room. And for some reason, you couldn’t help but reciprocate it. When he saw your smile, he nearly beamed.

“Keep your chin up, human,” he said softly. A calloused finger hitched itself under your chin and lifted it, just as he had said. “And don’t let them know how much it pains you to do this. They will only use it against you.”

“So I truly must stay this way?” You asked quietly. “I must remain as this…whore?”

“Unfortunately, you’ve already agreed to it,” he said solemnly. “There’s little I can do to stop it now.” He paused, twisting his lips in thought. “I will try - I promise you that - but I cannot say that my pleas won’t fall on deaf ears.”

With that, he rose to his feet, his hands on your shoulders pulling you with him. “Now, I have to go,” he said quietly. “I had to sneak past your guards to get in here, and I have to be out before they realise.”

Ah yes, Harden and Carson, the guards that Amarantha had stationed at the door to your chambers, and your two most frequent clients. You watched as Lucien made his way to the door, the gold of his dagger hilt shimmering in the candlelight. He paused, just for a moment, and turned back to you.

“Just remember,” he said slowly. “You can’t trust Rhysand. Don’t take anything he says at face value.”

You just nodded as he threw you one more sympathetic smile, only the second real smile you had ever seen from him, and disappeared back into the hall, the door clicking behind him as he went.

After that visit, Lucien began coming to the mountain once a month, frequently checking in on you, and bringing Amarantha news from the Spring Court - you could only hope that it was false information, and that he wasn’t actually selling Tamlin out.

His arrival would always be the same. You would be in the throne room, surrounded by drunk faeries, waiting for one of them to pick you from the crowd and claim you for the night. Lucien would stride through the door, parting the crowds and earning snarls of distaste from the other Vanserra boys, who you quickly worked out to be his older brothers. He would stop at the foot of the dais, and request counsel with Amarantha, and as they left, his eyes would scan the crowd to find you, offering you a reassuring nod that told you he would find you that night.

He had begun informing Harden and Carson that he was a client, hoping to be serviced by the court’s whore during his visit, and they would let him into your chambers without a second question. He would bring with him news of the Spring Court, only for your ears, and messages from Tamlin. Usually, those messages conveyed only that he missed you, his sister, a title that you had cemented together over those months, and that he would find a way to get you out and take you home. You weren’t sure, when he said home, if he meant the Spring Court or the mortal lands. At the end of each meeting, Lucien would be sure to ruffle his clothes and hair, and you the sheets on your bed and your own hair, lest someone question what you had been doing.

It wasn’t until six months later that Amarantha even realised that Lucien had been coming to your chambers during his visits at all. However, it was on one late evening that you finally realised she knew.

As always, Lucien entered the throne room as you hovered on the outskirts of the room, trying to cover your modesty in the skimpy dress that you wore as you usually did. Your eyes followed his figure as he strode through the room, an heir of unadulterated confidence, and stopped to kneel at the edge of the dais. ���I bring news from the Spring Court,” he said, not looking up at Amarantha who lounged in her throne, a goblet of wine hanging from her thin fingers. “I beg an audience so that we may convene and discuss it.”

“Tomorrow,” Amarantha snarled. She leaned forward in her chair, peering down at the emissary. “For now, why not enjoy yourself? You work so hard, Lucien.” She smirked, those red lips curling into the malicious smile that you were so familiar with now. “I heard that you have quite the affinity for my favourite little pet whore. Why not let her show you a good time?”

Lucien’s shoulders tensed, but he bowed his head and rose to his feet, not another word uttered, before turning and scanning the crowd, the throne room now silent, until his golden eye landed on you. He strode toward you, and took your hand in his, making a move to depart through the parting crowd and retreat to the safety and relative comfort of your chambers. But Amarantha’s voice stopped him in his tracks, toxicity laced into every word.

“Leaving so soon?” She sneered. “Why not stay and enjoy the party for a while? I’m sure the whore can keep you company here.”

He winced and turned back to you, scanning your features as if to say, ‘if you’re not comfortable with this, we don’t have to, and I can make an excuse for us to go’. But you just nodded, and watched as his shoulders rose and fell with a shuddering breath. He led you now in the opposite direction, taking a seat at the table on the far side of the room. His legs spread ever so slightly, an invitation to sit, and whilst he grabbed your hips and pulled you down to him, his rough fingertips were still gentle against your skin.

Amarantha rose from her throne, clicking her fingers once to command that the others go back to what they had been doing, before taking slow steps down and long, floating strides toward us, coming to a pause before you. You flinched, but Lucien’s strong hands squeezed at their lingering presence on your hips, a silent comfort.

“I’m intrigued to know, emissary,” her voice snarled. “What does your High Lord think of you taking his lover to bed each time you come here?”

Lucien smirked, but you knew better than to think it was real humour he felt. “What Tamlin doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”

Amarantha’s sharp laughter echoed above the noise from the party. “Well then, I’ll ensure he never finds out.” Her dark eyes flashed, but Lucien simply tipped his head. She turned to the nearest servant. “Fetch some wine for our guest.”

“Two, please,” Lucien called, and the servant nodded, disappearing for a moment and returning with two goblets of wine. Lucien took one and handed you the other. The wine was the colour of blood, of Amarantha’s lips, of Lucien’s blood that day he had lost his eye.

“You plan to ply the whore with wine?” Amarantha smirked. “It is her job to do as you bid. You have no need to get her drunk first.”

Lucien let out a small chuckle, shooting me a sideways glance. “With the night that I’ve got planned for her, she’s going to need it.”

Amarantha laughed again, and the sound made my blood run cold. “Perhaps I’ve underestimated you, emissary,” she leered. “Enjoy the party.”

Lucien nodded once more, and Amarantha left, but you knew that her eyes were still trained on you and Lucien, watching, studying calculatingly, noting every movement that you both made. You knew what she was doing - she was trying to catch us in our falsehood, to ensure that there were no lies being spewed to her, and that Lucien did in fact have every intention of taking you to bed.

You felt his breath, hot on your neck as he leaned into your ear and whispered, “Just play along. There are too many eyes watching.”

You didn’t need to be told twice. After a while his hand left your hips, repositioning you slightly so that you were no longer perched on the edge of his knees, but instead completely on his lap, flush against his broad chest. One hand snaked its way around your waist, and the other came to rest on your thigh, higher than you thought was necessary for appearance sake, but you didn’t dare argue. You allowed your own arm to slip around his neck, the other cradling your wine, which was emptied and refilled more times that night than you would care to admit to.

Your skin was burning hot, flushed and riddled with gooseflesh. The fear of being caught in your lie was enough to make every hair on the back of your neck stand to attention, especially when a faerie dressed in all-black, presumably from Hewn City in the Night Court, struck up a conversation with Lucien about what he planned to do with you that night.

You winced at the crude conversation, knowing that none of it was true, but even just hearing him speak of you that way was enough to twist your stomach into knots. Lucien’s grip on your thigh tightened and released, tightened and released, his way of telling you that it wasn’t true, that he was just playing a part and he meant none of it. And you knew that already, but it didn’t stop you from downing two more glasses of faerie wine, and allowing the sweet drunken bliss to take over.

You leaned your head back against his shoulder and closed your eyes, taking in his scent. He smelt like the forest after a light rain, like apple cider and cinnamon, and you let the smell envelope you, let his arms hold you in place. The first moment of peace and tranquillity that you’d found since arriving Under the Mountain, and it had come from Lucien of all people.

You could still barely wrap your head around it, how it was he who came so regularly to check on you, he who made you feel better, he who protected you. He had once hated you so much, had resented you and loathed you being in the Spring Court - perhaps he still did. Maybe his words on his first visit had been true, that he simply didn’t think anyone deserved this, not even you. Either way, you were grateful for him, and grateful for the small semblance of normality that came with him.

You felt his hand hook under your legs, pulling them over his thighs, allowing you to nestle closer to him, so close to sleep that had evaded you for so long, finally feeling safe enough to let it overtake you.

When you woke the next morning, you were tucked into your bed, and Lucien was nowhere in sight. You couldn’t help but feel disappointed that he was gone, that the only friend you had in this wretched place, no matter how unlikely, had left without a word. Not that you had expected him to stay. He would never have done such a thing, if only for fear of Tamlin’s wrath should he ever find out that his emissary had spent the night in your chambers, even if only for appearances, and even if nothing would have actually happened.

Yet, you found yourself longing for that smell of him, that feeling of safety that he provided. Lucien, despite himself, despite his hatred to you, had become the only form of kindness that you received, and had quickly become the lesser of two evils. You could deal with Lucien’s snarky remarks and cold glares, even if they were few and far between now, if it meant that you were kept away from Amarantha, and away from her sickening court for even just one night.

He was your safety net now, and as much as you hated that it was him, and as much as he surely thought the same, he was all you had left.

Three years passed by in the blink of an eye, and yet nothing changed. You remained chained to that bed, and remained Amarantha’s loyal little pet whore. Lucien’s visits became more infrequent, citing problems in the Spring Court as the reasoning, and you felt the loneliness slowly taking over, wrapping you in its darkness. You began to fall in on yourself, to refuse food, leaving you nothing more than skin and bone - it always came up after your clients left anyway. You stopped speaking, no longer pretending to be that good little servant to your clients, who feigned laughter at their jokes and faked pleasure in bed. You no longer made any effort with anyone at all. You became a shell of yourself, and everyone could see it.

When, to your surprise, Rhysand came to visit you, appearing in a cloud of dark shadows inside your chambers without so much as a knock on the door, you hadn’t seen Lucien in nearly five months. Rhysand looked you over, curled up on your bed, wrapped around yourself. You didn’t even so much as spare him a glance.

“You’re playing a dangerous game,” he muttered. It was the first time he had come to your room since the day he had shown you this prison. “Amarantha isn’t happy with how you’re acting. The court’s men are complaining.”

“Go to hell.” It came out in no more than a whisper, your voice aching at the first use for months. Rhysand chuckled.

“I think it’s too late for that. We’re already here,” he stated, circling the bed to crouch down in front of you. You didn’t allow your eyes to focus on him, his face a blur of dark skin and violet eyes and black shadows. “You need to eat something.”

“Why do you care?” You growled out.

“You’re right,” he said, throwing his hands into the air. “I shouldn’t care. Except that I do. I gave a lot to get you this position, to get you out of that cell and save your life. Now you’re throwing away all of my hard work.”

You didn’t grace him with an answer, and he simply tutted his tongue, running a hand through his dark locks. “If Amarantha thinks that you are no longer of use, what do you think will happen?” Again, no answer. “She’ll kill you.”

“Then let her,” you mumbled, fighting back a sob. “Lucie was right, this isn’t living anyway.”

Rhysand groaned in frustration. “Do you think your little emissary would be happy if you were killed?” He snapped. “Do you think your High Lord would be pleased?”

“He’s not my High Lord, and Lucien isn’t my emissary,” was the only reply that you could muster. Rhysand groaned again, but seemed to give up fighting. He knew as well as you did that there was nothing he could do to change your mind.

“Well, if you’re really not going to eat anything, then prepare yourself,” he stated blandly, rising to his feet. “You’ve got an important client coming to visit.”

And then he was gone.

The important client in question was a High Fae from the Autumn Court, and as soon as he entered your chambers you knew him to be one of Lucien’s brothers - the second eldest, if you were correct in your thinking. He hovered by the door awkwardly, as if not sure how to proceed, and you lounged on the bed. You watched him, but didn’t move to bring him closer to you, didn’t spread your legs or edge him into your bed. He pulled off his bow and quiver and placed them on the vanity table, before slowly moving closer to the bed.

It was fast, and messy, and painful, but you kept still, allowing him to take from you whatever he needed, as so many others had done before. It wasn’t until the final few thrusts that you allowed your eyes to open and focus on the mirror across from you, drawing them down to the quiver on the table. Your heart nearly stopped.

Ash arrows.

You knew the stories, that ash arrows were the only way to kill a faerie. Perhaps they would be your salvation, would be your ticket to freedom. The Vanserra brother finished with a growl, rolling off you, muttering something about cleaning himself up, before disappearing into the washroom. You moved quickly and quietly while he was gone, unsure of how much time you had left before he came back. You pulled one of the ash arrows from the quiver, studied it as it sat heavy in your palm for a moment, and slipped it under the mattress, sliding back under the covers, pulling the sheets up to cover my modesty.

The red-head appeared again, and quickly dressed, grabbing his weapons, not noticing the missing arrow. He threw you one last sneer over his shoulder, and made a promise that he would return later in the week. Little did he know that you would be here.

You had hoped that the ash arrow would kill you the second that you plunged it into your stomach, but little did you know that those stories you had grown up on were greatly exaggerated.

It was Lucien that found you. You hadn’t even known that he was Under the Mountain that day, but even through the haze of blood-loss, you could still hear his shouts and cries and wails, could still feel his arms pull you into his lap, his blood-sticky fingers pushing the hair away from your face as he practically begged you to come back, for his sake, for Tamlin’s sake.

A sharp pain erupted through your stomach as the ash arrow was pulled from your body, but you didn’t even flinch, not enough energy to even register the pain. The metallic stench of magic filled your nostrils, and even in your disorientation, you knew that Lucien was trying, and failing to heal you. And then there was another voice, lower than Lucien’s - Rhysand.

They worked in tandem, another wave of metallic magic flooding your nostrils, masking the bitter stench of your own blood as two sets of magic worked to heal the gaping wound in your abdomen. Something dripped on your cheek, blood that had coated the ends of Lucien’s hair and now fell to my face.

Their voices became more distant, foggier and muted, as you wandered closer to that light, to the end of the line.

You didn’t die. You found out later that Lucien had stayed Under the Mountain as you recovered, and had stayed in your room every day until you woke up. Rhysand hadn’t returned, however, but you couldn’t help but consider what Lucien had said about him, about how he couldn’t be trusted. If he had truly been working against you, would he have helped save your life? Maybe it was simply a means to an end, to keep you alive so that you could keep up this charade, and play out his and Amarantha’s plan, yet after that day you had a new-found respect for him.

Lucien was still there when my eyes fluttered open, taking in that same bed-chamber, almost coughing out a cry when you realised that your own plan had failed, and you were still stuck in that prison. He rushed to your bedside as soon as he saw that you were awake, the mattress dipping with his weight as he sat down.

“Y/N?” He whispered the question. You allowed your blurred eyes to fall to him, noting the relief on his face, a peculiar stance for someone who had hated you so much. And yet, you could only assume that he no longer loathed you, for if he did, surely he wouldn’t have spent so much time there, so much time checking on you and protecting you. Surely he wouldn’t have saved your life, wouldn’t have been such a frantic mess when he saw the blood pouring from the wound made by the ash arrow that had been protruding from your gut. In truth, the hatred that you had once felt for him had dissipated too. You didn’t despise him anymore, much to your own surprise, because he was the only kindness that you still had left. He was the only one who seemed to care. “Thank the Cauldron!”

It only took a second for your features to contort and crinkle, eyes screwed shut as the sobs wreaked through your body. Lucien simply pulled you closer to him, and held you as you cried, as you mourned and grieved for your own worthless existence.

“It didn’t work,” you sobbed into his chest.

“I know,” he whispered into your hair. “You’re lucky I was here, and that Rhysand of all people helped.”

“Lucky?” You cried. “You think I’m lucky? I wanted that ash arrow to kill me, I wanted it to end my miserable life! I can’t live like this, Lucien! I can’t do it anymore!”

He pulled back, face pale with shock as he searched your features, brows furrowed. “Y-You mean you did that to yourself?” You let out another choked sob, nodding your head. “Aeryn got thirty lashes for that.”

Aeryn, his brother from the Autumn Court, the one you had stolen the ash arrow from. And it all came down to that; here, under this mountain, your life was worth only thirty lashes against his back. But Lucien didn’t speak of it again, not when you let out another shaking gasp surrounding a wailing sob, and he pulled you back into his chest and rocked you gently. You let that scent - his scent - envelope you once more, just as it had that day in the throne room, and allowed it to comfort you into calmness.

Lucien returned to the Spring Court a few days later to inform Tamlin of what had happened and assure him that you were ok. That, much to your own despair, you were still alive.

And so, your life returned to what it had been. When you were strong enough to return to your duties, the men began knocking on your door once more, and you returned to despising your own existence.

[delicatebarness]

the manuscript | chapter seven

Summary: A night partying leads to unexpected consequences, prompting a stern confrontation and a new set of rules. Boundaries are tested and reveal deeper complexities in a forming relationship.

Warnings: Age Gap. (Dr Barnes: late 40s & Reader: early 20s). Emotional Manipulation. Power Imbalance. Physical Punishment. Alcohol Use. Use of foreign language.

Word Count: 2123

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A/N: You all have @pattiemac1 to thank for that scene. - Please feel free to leave feedback or let me know where and how you want the story to continue, this is just as much yours as mine. - B

The Manuscript: @mostlymarvelgirl | @mrsnikstan | @angelbabyyy99 | @kaithesimps-blog | @julvrs

Everything: @hallecarey1 | @pattiemac1 | @uhmellamoanna | @scraftsku35 | @ozwriterchick | @sapphirebarnes

The days following the intense encounter with James, as he requested you call him now, were a whirlwind of emotions. The memory of his commanding presence and the way he challenged you, couldn’t be shaken from your memory. You poured yourself into the assignment, determined to meet his expectations. 

Immersing yourself in the intricate details, you worked diligently on your narrative while sitting in your dorm room. The rhythmic clacking of your keyboard was suddenly interrupted, by a knocking at your door. You sighed as you stood up to open it, Peter stood before you with a broad grin on his face. 

“Hey! I’ve got a fun plan for us!” he announced, leaning against the doorframe with his arms crossed.

“What is it?” you asked. You tried to match his enthusiasm despite your efforts to focus on the assignment. 

“There’s a party tonight at the house. Everyone’s going to be there, and I want you to come,” he said, his eyes sparkling with excitement. 

Thinking about the assignment and the attention it needed, you hesitated. “I don’t know, Pete. I’ve got to get this assignment done. James… Dr. Barnes gave me this strict deadline and I need to finish it.” 

Rolling his eyes playfully, Peter laughed. “Come on, you need a break. You’ve been cooped up in here for days.” He gestured toward the stack of take-out boxes piling up. “It’ll be fun, I promise. I’ll bring you back in the morning to finish.” 

“Peter–” you began, but he cut you off.

“Please, just this once. Let loose a little, I’ll make sure you have a good time, I promise.” he coaxed, reaching out to cup your cheek. 

You nodded, reluctantly. “Okay, fine. But, I’m not drinking. I need to stay focused for tomorrow.” 

“Deal,” he agreed, yet his eyes held a mischievous glint. 

~

Surrounded by loud music, you found yourself at the fraternity house. Laughter and the smell of alcohol filled your senses as Peter handed you a drink. He insisted it was just soda. Trusting him, you took a sip from the red cup, not noticing the subtle taste of alcohol mixed in it. 

He refilled your cup as the night progressed, and you began feeling increasingly lightheaded. It was too late when you realized that the drinks he had been giving you were not just soda. Peter was too engrossed in the party when you stumbled slightly trying to leave the house. 

Your head spun as you navigated the streets, frustration began to mix with the alcohol. Pulling out your phone, you started to send emails without thinking. The words flowed in drunken rambles. Your inhibitions were gone. 

“I’m so lost and drunk. I don’t know where I am. I can’t think straight. Please, help me.” 

The reply came through almost immediately: “Where are you? I’ll come get you, stay there.” 

Sending your locating, you leaned against a lamppost to steady yourself.  A car pulled up beside you within minutes. A mix of concern and frustration etched across James’ face as he stepped out. 

“Get in,” he demanded, opening the passenger door for you. 

Your words slurred as you rambled to him. “James, you make me feel things I don’t understand. I can’t stop thinking about you,” you paused to look over at him as he drove. “I want you to kiss me… please.”

His jaw tightened as he glanced over at you. “You’re drunk. We can talk about this when you’re sober.” 

“But, I need to feel you,” you mumbled, tears welling up in your eyes. “Please, just one kiss.” 

“No,” he said firmly.

You pouted, frustration bubbled up inside you. “Почему?” you asked in Russian, you hoped that could sway him. 

He sighed, pulling into a parking spot outside your brother’s apartment building. Turning to face you, his features softening. “Again, you’re drunk. And, Doll, I’m worried that if I kiss you, then, I might not be able to stop myself.” 

“Пожалуйста,” you begged, continuing the Russian. 

“No,” he repeated. “You deserve better than this. When I kiss you, I want it to be when you’re fully aware. Not like this.” 

“But I want you now,” you insisted, your voice taking on a desperate edge, crossing your arms over your chest. 

“No,” annoyance grew in his tone, leaving no room for argument. “Not tonight.” 

“Please, James,” you whimpered, the frustration and longing mixed in your chest. “I need you. I can’t stop, and it hurts.” 

His expression softened, yet he remained resolute. “And, I want you too.” he sighed, placing his hand gently against your thigh. “But, not like this. You need to be sober, and you need to be sure.” 

Tears spilled down your cheeks. “I am sure. I want you, James. Please, just kiss me,” you begged, your voice breaking. 

Shaking his head, his resolve unwavering. “No, Doll.” 

"Пожалуйста, Джеймс, поцелуй меня," you pleaded in Russian, your voice trembling as desperation took hold. 

The grip on your thigh tightened, his eyes darkening yet, he remained steadfast. "Нет, малышка,” his voice echoed throughout the car, rippling off the metal and glass. 

“Why?” you cried, the confusion and frustration making your voice waver. “Why won’t you just kiss me?”

James took a deep breath, his arm moved from your thigh and up to your cheek. His eyes locked onto yours with an intensity that made your heart race as his thumb brushed your tears away. “Because, Baby Girl, if I kiss you now, I won’t stop. And you deserve more than just a kiss from me when you’re not in your right mind. You deserve everything, and I want to give you everything… just, not like this.” 

You felt defeated as you whimpered. “But I need you, James.” 

“And you’ll have me,” he promised, “when the time is right.” 

~

James helped you out of the car and up to your brother’s apartment. As you leaned against the doorframe, he gave the door a firm knock. Before you could say anything, he left and disappeared around the corner. 

The door opened, revealing your brother’s concerned face. 

“Hey, what’s going on?” Marc asked, taking in your disheveled appearance with widened eyes. 

“I’m… sorry,” you slurred, the exhaustion hitting you. “I was at a party, and Peter got me drunk.” 

Wrapping an arm around your shoulder, Marc guided you inside. “Come on, let’s get some water in you,” he said gently. “We’ll talk in the morning.” Marc helped you to the couch as James’ refusal to kiss you left you feeling rejected.

~

You woke with a throbbing headache along with a heavy sense of dread. Memories of the night before were a blur, yet the most vivid image was of James’ stern face and his refusal. You cringed thinking about your desperate appearance, and how out of control you would have seen.

As your morning progressed, you realized the dread was the looming deadline of your assignment. Despite your hangover, you forced yourself back to your dorm and finished the narrative you had started. You knew you couldn’t avoid James, and the sooner you faced him, the better.

Making your way to his office, you clenched the completed assignment in your hands. Your heart pounded as you approached the familiar door, and your palms began to sweat with anxiety. 

“Come in,” his voice called from within before you could start knocking. 

He looked up, his eyes cold and piercing as you stepped inside. “Good morning, Miss Spector. Do you have the assignment?” 

You nodded, handing the papers to him with trembling hands without a word. He took them from you, brushing his fingers against yours for a brief moment. A shiver shot down your spine. Taking a glance over the assignment before setting it aside, he gestured to the seat opposite him. 

“Let’s talk about last night,” he said, his voice stern.

Swallowing hard, you felt the heat rose to your cheeks. “I’m incredibly sorry, Dr. Barnes. I… I don’t remember everything, but I’m aware I crossed the line.” 

Standing up, James walked around the desk to stand in front of you. “You begged me, multiple times to kiss you. Do you remember that?” 

Nodding slowly, you avoided his gaze as the embarrassment washed over you. “Yes, I do. Again, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have… I was drunk, and I wasn’t in the right mind.” 

His expression hardened as he crossed his arms over his chest. “And, why were you drunk?” 

You bit your lip, tears beginning to prick at the corners of your eyes. “I went to a party with my boyfriend. I thought I was drinking soda, but he… but it wasn’t. I didn’t realize until it was too late.” 

He shook his head as he sighed. “You had an important assignment due, Miss Spector, and instead of focusing on your work, you chose a party. Not acceptable behavior, especially from someone who claims they want to prove themselves.” 

“I’m sorry,” you repeated, your voice almost inaudible. “It won’t happen again.” 

“No, it won’t,” his jaw clenched. “You need to understand there are consequences for your actions. You begged me in both English and Russian. Now, you’re going to count for each time you begged.” 

Your eyes widened, in both shock and confusion. “What? Dr– James, please…” 

“Silence,” he commanded, his voice as cold as ice. “This is your punishment for not prioritizing your work. You will bend over and you will count in both languages for every time you begged.”

You knew there was no way out as you nodded. Your heart pounded, a mixture of fear and excitement rushing through you at his demeanor. 

“Come here,” he ordered, patting the spot at the front of his desk. 

Obeying, you felt vulnerable and exposed. Your hands gripped the edge of the desk as he positioned you so you were bent over, lifting your skirt.

“Start counting,” he instructed, his voice devoid of any warmth.

The sharp sting as the firm smack landed on your backside was immediate, taking a deep breath you tried to steady your voice. “One,” your voice betrayed you, trembling.

“Two,” you counted, the heat built with each strike.

By the time you had reached ten, your voice was strained, struggling to keep steady. “Eleven,” you whimpered, your body tensing. 

“Now, in Russian,” his tone was unyielding as he commanded. 

"Один," you gasped as another smack landed.

"Два," your voice quivered. 

You lost count as you reached "десять," the pain and humiliation overwhelming you. “Please, James, I can’t…” 

“From the beginning,” he ordered, his voice as cold as the metal you now felt against the heat. 

The cold metal sent a shockwave through your body, the smacks were harder now. "Один," you struggled to maintain control as you gasped. 

Your body trembled as you managed to count correctly this time, you were sobbing as the punishment finally came to an end. 

James’ eyes softened slightly as he looked at you, helping you stand. You were a mess, your cheeks completely drenched from your tears. Unable to form coherent words, you went non-verbal. His touch was now surprisingly tender as he gently brushed your hair away from your face. 

“Good girl,” he murmured with a soothing voice. “You did well.” 

Your mind is filled with a fog of pain and shame. Despite the punishment, his presence was a strange comfort as he continued to stroke your hair. 

“Shh,” he whispered. “You’re alright, just breathe, Baby Girl,” 

Your mind gradually came back, the haze lifting slightly. You nodded, acknowledging his words as you still couldn’t bring yourself to speak. 

Stepping back, his expression turned serious. “We’re going to set some ground rules,” he said, tone leaving no room for argument. “First, when you are overwhelmed, you will come to me. Do not seek escape from parties or alcohol. Understood?” 

“Yes, sir–”

“Sergeant,” he cut you off, his tone venomous.

“Yes, Sergeant,” you corrected yourself.

“Secondly,” he continued, “Physical intimacy will only be conducted when I deem it necessary. There will be no kissing.” 

A pang of disappointment coursed through you, yet you understood the necessity. “Yes, Sergeant,” you shakenly whispered. 

“And lastly,” he said, his gaze intense. “No more public displays with your supposed boyfriend.” 

“Yes, Sergeant,” you replied, a strange sense of comfort in his structured rule came over you. 

James nodded, satisfied with your obedience. “Good girl. Now, go back to your dorm and rest. We’ll talk more after I’ve read over your work.” 

You nodded gratefully, determined to prove yourself to James, and you started to leave his office. A feeling of relief and trepidation washed over you. “Thank you, Sergeant.” With a renewed sense of purpose, you left his office and returned to your dorm room, honoring the rules and proving yourself worthy. 

---

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[bratshaws]

through the hourglass 28. brb x oc

a/n: AAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAH

pairing: plus size!oc x rooster

warnings: fluff, ROOSTER IS GOING TO BE A DAD!!!!

goodness gracious (pls read this one to know more what this fic is about!!)

chapter

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-

He finally messaged her when December arrived and she was already two months along. God it was almost torture and if it wasn’t for Penny being the voice of reason Beatrice would surely lose it. She got the message in the middle of the night and immediately broke down when she saw it, trying her best to cover her crying so Jolene wouldn’t come over. 

Apparently there were some hiccups in the mission but they were all okay, Beatrice had to calm down her breathing before she wrote something back or else she’d just choke on her own sobbing any second now. 

Bea (12:34)

Roos, oh my god, I am so happy to hear from you. I was starting to get worried but I didn’t want to send you a message and then make you worried :( because you did say you’d take a while to talk back to me.

Roos (12:36)

Gorgeous, it’s okay, I’m glad to be talking to you too. We’ll video chat tomorrow, okay? I already have everything ready too.

Bea (12:40)

Okay. I’m just glad you guys are all okay though, I really am.

She licks her lips, hovering her thumbs over the digital keyboard before continuing.

Bea (12:41)

Did you get my gift?

He takes a while to answer, maybe a few more minutes and Beatrice takes that time to drop her phone to her chest, rubbing her forehead with her fingertips, fighting back another wave of tears that tickled the back of her eyes, only looking at her phone again when it buzzes. There’s a picture of him holding the still closed box, she lets out a relieved sigh once she sees it, and it looks incredibly small in his hand.

Roos (12:46)

This is the one right? 

Bea (12:47)

Yes!That’s the one! You didn’t open yet did you?

Roos (12:49)

Wanted to but held myself back, your letter said to wait until we video chatted. I gotta admit I got the tingly fingers,I wanna know what it is.

Bea (12:51)

I know, handsome, but it’s just a little while,right? Until tomorrow, then you can enjoy what is inside all you want.

Roos (12:52)

Well,I always lose pens so this one is more than welcome.

Oh if only he knew.

Roos (12:54)

Babe, listen I have some other things to finish but I’ll be here later, alright? Promise.

Bea (12:55)

I know Roos :) I have to sleep too, so…until we talk again?

Roos (12:55)

You bet ,gorgeous. I love you.

Bea (12:56)

I love you too, so much <3

And that was their last communication for the night. Beatrice sighs as the phone falls onto the bed, her now free hands coming up to rub her face up and down as she looks at the ceiling, “He’s okay,” she whispers, closing her eyes, “He’s okay, he is okay. God…I was so scared, so were you huh?” her stomach still looked the same, apparently it starts showing on the third to fourth month so it was easier to hide her pregnancy until Rooster knew about it.

“Your daddy is going to meet you real soon!” she smiles, gently placing her hand on top, “I have to say I’m nervous, I don’t know why but I am.” Beatrice chews her lower lip, ‘God, everyone is going to lose their mind, Mav is going to lose his mind. Oh God.” honestly she was just happy to hear from him after so long, it didn’t matter in the end how people would react to the news anymore as long as he was safe.

Beatrice places her phone on the nightstand, then rolls to his side, burying her face into his pillow and smiling when she whiffs his cologne, hugging it close to herself until she falls asleep. 

She had no dreams, at least she doesn’t remember any when she wakes up. What she is surprised to see is that it is raining a lot, the sound of thunder wakes her up - followed by the puppies whining and barking downstairs, undoubtedly alerted by the sound. Bea groans, sitting up on the bed, wincing at another thunder as she wakes up fully, walking to the bathroom to at least look presentable and then walking downstairs.

The four puppies are all looking out the glass doors, wagging their tails, the white one stood by her back paws and pressed her front ones to the glass, barking at the large raindrops as Jolene stood back keeping an eye on them, “Well, it sure is raining.” the sound of Beatrice’s voice makes them hurriedly rush to her feet to greet her, yapping and jumping a bit, the brown and white one running between her legs as their mom just wagged her tail once she received the morning pets, “Morning you guys, guess what?”

The puppies stood in front of her with their tails wagging, “Today you guys will meet Rooster! Well, partially.” Jolene’s tail wags even harder and she barks out in excitement at the mention of her second favorite human in this whole wide world, spinning in place “I know! I know Jojo! I’m excited too!”

Beatrice walks to the cabinet where she keeps the puppies’ soft food, the sound of the bag immediately making the tiny dogs surround her like a wall, whining and yapping at her feet to get something already. After she fills the giant bowl with their food and sets it down, she walks to the table, leaning her head on her hand with a little smile towards Jolene.

Her pitbull slowly makes her way over, plopping her huge head on Beatrice’s thigh, giving her a soft sigh that probably meant she was extremely relieved to have her puppies distracted with something else that wasn’t her. Beatrice chuckles quietly, gently petting her dog’s head repeatedly, enjoying the sound of the puppies eating and the rain outside, “Yeah, we are both mamas now.” she says still petting her “Can you believe it?”

Jolene looks at Bea with her big eyes, boofing quietly and then tilting her head to her cheek is touching her owner’s thigh now, the petting never stopping. Beatrice grins, looking down at her phone to see it was seven in the morning, but with the rain outside it was almost as if the day hadn’t started yet. She could see the puddles in the backyard already, undoubtedly Jolene was going to teach her kids how to play in them, how to roll in them and of course how to bite raindrops…but only once the rain lessened a little bit. 

Beatrice just sighs,looking out to where she could see the dark clouds standing by, dark and thick, shining with lightning in the distance. She looks up when the light flickers above her head, “Oh no, we don’t need a blackout today, right? I’m going to finally talk to Rooster.” the light stopped flickering almost immediately and Beatrice blinked at it, “Uh…thanks. Let’s hope it stays that way, please.”

She was talking to the air now, oh she was really losing her mind.

Beatrice shakes her head, looking down at her stomach when Jolene presses her snout to it, sniffing the fabric of her sleeping shorts before her eyes look up at the brunette, “Yep, there’s a baby here, Jojo.” she grins, gently caressing the area with her palm, trying to feel if it was any different from a month before but she couldn’t see it. It only started to show on the fourth month from what she’s seen…and while her stomach wasn’t flat as most of the pictures she looked up online and it showed the pregnancy, she was sure she’d be able to notice it once Rooster came back.

God, just imagining his reaction to her gift was already making her vibrate with excitement, chewing her lower lip with a smile, “I think he’s going to cry a bit.” she whispers to Jolene, who now had her eyes closed and was snoring quietly, “I might cry a bit too…everyone else might cry if I’m honest with you Jojo…especially Mav. Oh God, he’s going to…yeah, he’s going to go crazy.”

–

Rooster was looking at Beatrice’s gift resting by his side was he waited for the connection to finally work, supporting his face on his open palm as he tried to think why the hell would she want him to keep the gift of a new pen saved up for so long.

There was no way it was anything else but a pen, it had the shape of one!!

But he just did as she asked, because when didn’t he? She could ask him to bring her the moon and he would do so. Rooster looked at the circle that faded every now and again with the dreaded words 'establishing connection, stand by’ on top of it, almost as if it was mocking him, the very voice of Nelson from the Simpsons going ‘HAHA’ surely came to mind the longer he waited.

Maybe he was just on edge because of what happened, he was glad everyone was okay but it was really close. He might’ve heard from the higher ups that they would probably cut this mission short a month, maybe he’d come home sooner but there was no way of knowing that yet. He hoped so, he missed Bea, the scent pouch was good but…it wasn’t his wife.

He taps his fingers rhythmically against the table, glowering down at the connection symbol and trying his best to not lose his mind, “Come on.” he begins, “Come on. You can work, you worked with everyone else but not with me? What the fuck.” and as if on cue, the circle stopped and it finally let him know that a connection had been established. “Oh thank God.”

It takes a few seconds for Bea’s face to appear, but once she does, her smile is brilliant and her eyes at shining, “Brad!”

“Fuck,gorgeous you are a sight to sore eyes.” he says with a sigh, a relief that’s bigger than it appears to be, he’s so immensely thankful to see Beatrice, he’s so thankful to whoever has been protecting them all lately “I’m so happy to see you.”

Beatrice’s cheeks turned red and even with the staticy image he could see it, “I’m happy to see you too…how are you?”

He laughs humorlessly, rubbing his forehead with his fingertips, “I’m…going through it, kinda tired but, glad that everything went fine.”

“Was it that bad?”

Her eyebrows lowered and he almost regretted mentioning it again, he could see the worry in her green eyes, “It wasn’t that bad.” he says, folding his arms over the table, “Annoying, but not that bad.” she didn’t need to worry even more.

“Okay…oh!” He sees that she picks up the laptop, turning it slowly around and then tilting the screen over a bit. He sees Jolene, sleeping peacefully with her puppies all nestled on her body, the little white one was sleeping right on her mother’s neck, with the tiny pink tongue out. “I sent you the pics but I don’t know if you saw it, so,”

“Oh my god, they are so fucking cute,Bea.” he is in awe and almost grabbing at the screen, “They are so tiny oh my God.”

“Yeah, and well, most of them already have homes.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, um, Bianca and Mikey wanted two so there’s only two left.”  she points to the white one and to the white and brown one, “The two siblings.”

He did not hesitate, “We’re keeping them. Both of them. There’s no way I’m letting them both go, what the hell.”

Beatrice looks at him with wide eyes once she’s back on the screen, then laughs quietly,”Well, then it’s settled, these two will stay. They’ll need names though.”

“Jack and Eleanor. To keep within the musical names.”

“Jumpin’ Jack Flash and Eleanor Rigby?”

He smiles even wider when she answers, they are really one and the same when it comes to stuff like that, “Yep, you got it.” His eyes then shifted to the box he kept by his side ever since he sat down, tapping his finger against his jawline as he looked, “So…about my gift…can I open it now?”

Beatrice didn’t reply for a while and when she did he wasn’t expecting her question, “There’s no one else with you,right?”

“What? No?” he’s already grabbing the little box and laughing a bit, “Baby, what did you put in here hm? You know how those things make me go crazy.” but she didn’t laugh back, she was smiling but she wasn’t laughing - and was the image so bad he was imagining her eyes were shining with something other than the usual love? But he just gave her a confused look, unwrapping the colorful paper that covered it, being careful to not rip it too much or else it’d be a mess in there.

Once there was no other type of cover on the box, he flipped the lid open and furrowed his brow when he saw the card glued inside it, “What’s the size of a rice grain but not a rice?” he could hear Beatrice’s soft sniffles, but when he looked up she was just smiling at him, “Bea, you know I have no patience for riddles, that’s why I suck in some games.”

“I know but…well, keep going.”

He chuckles again, still confused, looking down at the wrapped pen inside, kept together by the paw print sticker, “I mean you really went all out on this, huh?” he says as he rips the paper open, “All to give me a new pen, baby I know I lose my pens a lot but you don’t have to–”

And he immediately stops. 

Because that’s not a pen, in fact that’s not even something he was expecting to see. He is looking down at the two pregnancy tests, one on top of the other, the red lines screaming at him. “...wait…” he laughs because he doesn’t know what else to do, picking the two tests up, fanning them out to have a better look, “Wait…wait, baby, is this a joke or something?”

The second time he looks over at Beatrice, she’s really crying, wiping her face the best she could, sniffling, giving him the most teary smile he had ever seen, “I-It’s not a joke,Brad.”

His smile drops after she says it and his eyes widen when he looks at the tests one more time. The chair scrapes loudly when he stands to his feet, brown irises going from one test to the other, repeating the pattern over and over until he could no longer distinguish anything else around him. “...how…far along…?”

Beatrice sniffles, “T-Two months.” she says, “I-It’s not very visible yet but…it will be when you come back.”

And he falls back on the chair, dropping the tests and holding his head in his hands, his eyes stinging and a sudden wave of emotion taking over him. The tears came out before he could stop them, he didn’t plan to honestly, and he looked down at the white sticks that held so much power within them still in pure shock. “...Bea…” he begins with a shaky voice, “Gorgeous…gorgeous we are going to have a baby?” When they meet eyes, Beatrice nods in response, laughing tearfully.

Never had he felt like this before, it was euphoria and fear and happiness all in one punch, he was heavy but he was floating, he was under the sea but he could breathe. It was the most amazing and the strangest feeling he ever had in his entire life…it was like he was in a complete different world, like he stepped through a portal into an alternate reality but this was his reality.

He was going to be a dad.

He was going to be a dad!!

“Holy shit.” he laughs just as she did, with the tears trailing down his eyes onto the desk, the sounds from around him disappearing because of his own thoughts. When he calms himself down enough, his smile still wide and bright, “...baby we are going to be parents.” she nods, “Does…does anyone else know?”

Beatrice chews her lower lip, “Well…Shells and Ev knew by accident and Penny sort of sniffed it out of me…but no one from my family knows…I really wanted you to know first. I know technically it’s not how it happened but…” and she shrugs at him with a sheepish smile.

“Baby, baby I don’t care. As long as I know I–” he leans back on the chair with his hands going up to his hair, “Bea, there’s a baby growing inside you. A baby we both created…holy fuck.”

“Yeah…I know…”

“We need to think of names already.” he says, the ‘dad’ mode turning on instantly, “We need to go shopping too, buy a crib, buy…baby stuff…I…” and he stills couldn’t believe those words were coming out of his mouth.

When he was much younger he considered being a father, but he never achieved that mainly because there was never an actual ‘connection’ between him and the person he was with at the time, not like what he had with Beatrice.  And now, he was going to have that!

“Well…would you say it was worth it waiting for your surprise?”

Bradley looks down at the tests, cheeks flexed as he smiles, “...Hell yeah, gorgeous. It was more than worth it.”

Beatrice opens her mouth to say more, but she looks back at the windows when there’s a loud sound coming from outside, loud enough to wake the puppies and Jolene, which then evolved in a complete yapping round, “Sorry Roos, it’s raining a lot today and I think th-yerk-bzzt.”

Her connection gets fuzzy, her audio delayed and Rooster just smiles at her “It’s okay gorgeous, it’s fine if you need to go.”

“I jut–puppies–thkk-”  she’s not aware her audio is having issues, but he does see her wave him goodbye after blowing a kiss towards the camera. He does the same, waiting until her side goes dark, leaving him alone in the room with her gift still in front of him.

Rooster exhales through his mouth, smiling widely at the pregnancy tests, holding them to his eye level because he just needed another look, just to be sure it was actually real. He was going to be a father, holy shit, he and Bea were going to be parents…he wondered, almost out loud, if this was a reward for what happened weeks before.

If all that worry was just because he’d have this. Because now there was another reason for him to come home safe, one more reason to be extra careful…one more reason for his future child to not grow up like he did. He immediately clenches his eyes to get rid of the thought, standing to his feet and shoving Beatrice’s gift inside one of his pockets, walking out of the room and nodding to the officer who walked outside.

He wasn’t going to think like that. No, he wasn’t going to think like that. 

He is shook out of his thoughts when he sees Maverick close by, holding some papers in his hand, “Hey, how was your talk with Bea?” his nephew stops completely, giving him a weird look one that makes Pete furrow his brows and then arch one of them, “Rooster?”

“...Mav.”

“...what?”

“I gotta show you something.” he looks around for a second, “But you have to promise to not freak out too much.”

Maverick just gave his godson and even weirder look, “Freak out, why would I freak out-” only to see him pull out the two pregnancy tests from his pocket, holding them in front of Maverick’s eyes. And his uncle, for a brief second appeared to lose all air in his lungs, the papers he was holding slipped from his grasp to the floor and then, “...She’s pregnant?!” he asks, holding his nephew’s shoulders, “Beatrice is pregnant?!”

“Yes–”

“Rooster, don’t joke with me.” his nephew just gave him a look that translated to ‘do you really think I’d joke about that?’  “...oh shit,oh shit I think I need to sit down.”

[the-al-chemist]

The Beginning of a Symphony - Chapter 40

A/N: the school year is ending, and it’s time for another goodbye. This time, it’s Héloïse’s turn.

Warnings: fluff.

OCs mentioned: Lavinia Macmillan @kc-and-co, Henry Lovelace @lifeofkaze

June 1897

The final night of term had arrived. The end of year exams were over, the trunks were all packed, and everyone in the castle was ready to enjoy their summers at home.

It was strange, Héloïse thought as she made her way up through the corridors, but a not-insignificant part of her was sad to be leaving. She would not have expected it when she first arrived at Hogwarts that frigid day the previous January, but she was going to miss the ramshackle castle, the cold and airy Ravenclaw common room, the moving staircase that made it almost impossible to find one’s way anywhere on time, and the lessons and conversations held in the language she was starting to feel like she might one day be able to master.

She had not believed the headmaster or Professor Macmillan when they had told her that she might one day come to consider Hogwarts a sort of home, but now, she considered it just that.

Of course, the thing that had made all the difference to her enjoyment of her time at Hogwarts had been the friends she had made within its walls; the girls in her dormitory, Henry Lovecraft the American, the francophone Slytherins, Madam Khanna the librarian, and Jim Hexley, with whom Héloïse was on her way to meet at Astronomy tower for the last time until she returned to school in September.

Since the night of the Celestial Ball, the two of them had made a habit of spending time at the Astronomy Tower, returning there almost every evening just before sundown and remaining there until curfew. In those precious few hours, they would sit peacefully and read, or catch up on schoolwork, or watch the stars, or draw. Sometimes they would even spend the entire time talking, which was unusual for Héloïse. She had never spoken so much to one person before, and she got the feeling that no one had ever listened so much to Jim before.

Tonight, however, Jim did not seem to want to talk. Despite not having brought a book - sketchbook or otherwise - with him, he remained taciturn as Héloïse sat with her back against the wall and her eyes on the rising moon. Normally, she wouldn’t have minded, but it being the last time they would see one another for three months, she would have preferred it if he had wanted to talk.

Eventually, she sighed loudly and asked him, “Jim, why are you quiet?”

“I… I do not know what to say,” Jim told her. She frowned at him. “It seems that… that anything I might say would not be right thing. That it would be too inconsequential, or perhaps not inconsequential enough. And I, er… Well, I am trying to concentrate.”

“Concentrate?”

“Focus,” said Jim. He cleared his throat. “I want to make sure I remember exactly what you look like before we go home tomorrow. I fear that I may forget something.”

Héloïse laughed. “You have drawings, no?”

“I do, but I am not… I lack the ability to truly capture how lovely you are.”

“This is untrue,” Héloïse said, but she smiled at the compliment. “You are going to write to me this summer, yes?”

“Yes. Yes, definitely.”

“And when we are to return, we will to come back here every evening?”

“Of course,” Jim nodded. “If we could return tomorrow, I would. I do not truly wish to leave at all, because I will not…” He smiled. “Because you will be missing to me.”

“You are mocking of me?” Héloïse asked him, one eyebrow raised.

“No, never.”

“It is sounding like you are mocking of me.”

“I’m not, I promise,” said Jim, his cheeks flushing pink. “Really, I do not-”

“I know this, Jim,” Héloïse giggled. “It is a jest, no?” She reached out and squeezed Jim’s hand, and he looked less nervous. “I will to miss you, also. Very much so.”

With her free hand, she touched the side of Jim’s face and gently brought it closer to her own. Jim appeared to battle with his conscience before responding by kissing her, his fingers burying in the curls of her hair as she ran her thumb over the arch of his cheekbone, both of them pulling the other closer and closer with each passing moment.

The two of them had shared a few stolen kisses since the night of the Celestial Ball, but this one was warmer and firmer and fiercer than any of the others had been, and somehow, it seemed to carry more meaning. It was as if their lips were imparting a thousand words that neither had the ability to say aloud, as if this were yet another a new language Héloïse was being immersed in. It was as dizzying and bewildering as it had been to start learning English, and when she and Jim broke apart, she stayed silent with her lips pursed and eyebrows furrowed, contemplating the meaning of it.

“Héloïse,” said Jim, his voice gentle and doubtful, “are you quite well? Why are you quiet?”

“Oui. J’essaie de penser.”

“You… You’re thinking. What are you thinking?”

It took a little while for Héloïse to understand what she was thinking, but once she did, she knew exactly what words she had to say:

“Je t’aime.”

“Oh.” Jim nodded. “That’s good. I am glad that you like me. I rather like you too. In truth…” He paused, frowning slightly and blinking once. “The truth is, Héloïse, that I love you.”

He looked Héloïse with an expression that was so hopeful and so earnest that she had not the heart to point out his miscomprehension of her words. After all, she had taken this long to comprehend it herself.

“Yes, Jim. I love you, also.”

[miraculous-magicalconnections]

Progress Update:

I just spent far too long making a spreadsheet but at least now I have an accurate percentage for how far along I am on the first Arc of my rewrite

As of now, I'm just about 40% complete with the first arc of the story, most of it is outlines, but once I finish the revisions of the first few chapters, I should be able to knock out the last couple pretty easily

I still refuse to give a date of WHEN it'll be posted but I can promise that I'll continue to give updates and the occasional redesign here and there as I work on Arc 1 this month

If all goes according to plan, I should be able to start posting the story at the beginning of next month, but I make no promises as I have no idea if I'll get stuck or if something in my personal life will come up so take that with a grain of salt

Anyway, thanks for all the support so far everyone, and I'll catch you guys tomorrow for a couple new redesigns <3

[heaven-s-black-box]

Wright Anything Agency + Prosecutors Office= Chaos chpt.1

Return to File

Recovery date: May 25th, 2020

Description: The WAA's air conditioner breaks during an LA summer, so they go to the only place they can think of... the prosecutors office. Chaos ensues led by the youngest members of the Wright and Edgeworth families.

Notes: A entry series involving a descendant of a traveler, following the death of her mother it was determined Sky would be better off staying with Miles Edgeworth. This is an OC insert, the fantastical technobabble is just for looks

Related works: Miles adopts Sky, Trucy meets Sky

Chapters: 1 2 2.5 3 4 5 5.5

Word count: 2 452

Back to directory

June 21st 7:26 A.M Hey Miles So I was wondering, can the wright Anything agency  borrow some of the prosecutor office space? We uh, can’t really use our office rn It’s kind of a safety hazard Miles 7:35 A.M What on earth are you on about Wright? What’s wrong with your office? 7:36 A.M AC’s down Gonna get wayyyy too hot So What do you say Miles 7:36 A.M How did your air conditioner break? 7:39 A.M … long story? Trucy Miles 7:40 A.M No Find somewhere else to go Work never gets done when your children are involved And why don’t you just get it fixed? 7:45 Apparently a bunch of ACs decided to die Can’t get to us till end of the week So this is more can we stay for the whole  We Week Miles 7:48 Still no. 7:50 Fine Enjoy babysitting! :) Miles 8:25 A.M WRIGHT! I told you you couldn’t work here! So why are your children employees here? 8:26 A.M Klavier said Apollo could work with him since  they’re on a case together, Athena pestered  Blackquill till he caved, and Trucy’s there  cause the other two are there So! Can I come work in your office? Miles 8:27 A.M Fine. But only so you can keep them in line. 8:28 A.M Great! I’m on my way up! Miles 8:28 A.M What do you mean “On your way up”?

Not long after sending his question, there was a knock at his door. With a reluctant sigh he called for the person to enter and as expected, it was Wright. The smirk on his face told Edgeworth he’d been waiting. Of course he was. He knew the other prosecutors would let their favored agency members stay here for the week. The only person who would object was Edgeworth himself and all Wright had to do was give him a less favorable option than sharing his office. His two options now were A) Babysit his usual group of children plus the Wright Anything agency himself, or B) Share his office with Wright and have help babysitting. There was only one logical answer.

“Don’t worry, we’ll behave.” Wright had taken a seat on the couch, taking his papers out on the coffee table. So he’d actually brought his work? That didn’t mean he intended to do it. “Our AC is seriously broken. We just need a non-lethal place to work, and the prosecutor’s office seemed like a good idea.”

Edgeworth sighed, “I can’t help every defense agency out like this. What makes you so special?”

“Hmm…” Wright looked like he was thinking about it, but Edgeworth knew he wasn’t. “Boyfriend privileges,” he shrugged.

Edgeworths face turned slightly pink, “That won’t always work. And just so you know, the only reason I haven’t kicked you out yet is because there isn’t anything big this week. Sky and Franziska are flying in tomorrow,” Wright shuddered at the thought of Franziska, “and I believe prosecutor Sahdmadhi and detective Skye are here for work purposes starting Thursday.”

“Well…” Wright still seemed to be trying to do work, Edgeworth’s suspicion didn’t budge. Wright was always up to something, “It’ll be nice to see Prosecutor Von Karma again,” Liar, “And I’m sure Apollo will be happy to see prosecutor Sahdmadhi again.”

Edgeworth nodded and returned to his laptop. He had quite a bit of work to finish before his daughter and sister’s return, as he’d promised to spend time with Sky. When she’d left with her aunt, he’d been very busy and hadn’t even gotten to say goodbye. To make it up to her, he agreed to a movie night when she got back. It’d also be nice to have a runner in the building again. Usually during breaks, when she wasn’t abroad with her father or aunt, she’d help out around the office. This ranged from running papers between prosecutors or the Wright Anything agency, to making sure everyone ate and left at semi-decent times. It was like her part time job. 

They sat together in silence for quite a while. The only sound was the scratching of Wright’s pen on paper and Edgeworth tapping on his laptop. Edgeworth’s unease about having the Wright Anything agency around had slowly started to disappear. It helped that Wright kept checking his phone to check in with the others. He had to admit that working with Wright like this was nice. Maybe this week wouldn’t be so bad.

And then the phone rang…

---

“So herr forehead, why can’t you use the agency again?” 

“The AC broke,” Apollo mumbled, he was looking over evidence for his case tomorrow. 

Simon, who was feeding Taka, looked over, “Did Wright-dono forget to pay the bill?” Athena snickered and Trucy, who had been practising card tricks, stopped.

“No… it wasn’t daddy’s fault. This time.” Apollo smiled at this and Athena covered her mouth to stifle her laughter. “I was working on a new magic trick with Athena… and it sort of didn’t work.”

“And this is why we have a “no fire tricks in the agency”  policy,” Apollo hummed and passed a paper over to Klavier. 

Simon and Klavier had offered to let them work in their offices, but they’d declined because they did actually need to get work done. In fact, Mr. Wright had only agreed to let them work here (instead of the library) if they agreed to get actual work done. Athena had immediately gotten defensive because “we always do our work” and Apollo just sighed. Mr. Wright did have a point, it seemed outside of court, they never got work done. So, they’d decided to work in the cafeteria away from distractions, Apollo’s idea. Then the distractions decided to join them, Klavier’s idea. However, it’d been about an hour and they’d been working fine.

They were sitting together around a table. Trucy was working on card tricks for the most part, and Apollo and Klavier were working on their case. While Simon was doing paperwork for his case that ended yesterday, and Athena was playing with her mood matrix. It was surprisingly quiet, didn’t they have more prosecutors? A few people had come in for coffee, but the office always seemed too quiet. Klavier and Simon were doing their work on laptops while Apollo had to do it all by hand. He really needed a laptop.

“I’m booorrred, let’s take a break!” Athena piped up.

“Cykes-dono, you haven’t done anything yet.”

“Sure I ha-”

“Playing with your mood matrix doesn’t count,” Apollo grumbled looking up. “And we haven’t even been here for an hour.” He looked up at the clock, “okay, we’ve been here for a little over an hour. But you still haven’t done anything.” He felt a weight drop on his back.

“Come on Polly! Fifteen minutes, I’ll even help you guys after.” Trucy had draped herself over his back and was whining in his ear.

“Well then Fraulein,” Klavier leaned his chin on his hand and looked at Trucy, “ What do you propose we do?” 

---

“Chief prosecutor Edgeworth’s office, speaking? Yes?” Wright looked up at him. Edgeworth took off his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Is that so?” Wright felt a chill run down his spine as Edgeworth glared at him. “Yes, I’ll tell him. I’ll also come down myself. No, don’t tell them.”

“Sooo… What was that about?” Wright had a feeling he knew, but he’d give his kids the benefit of a doubt.

“Come with me.”

Edgeworth stood up and headed towards the door. Wright quickly shuffled his papers together and headed to the door, tripping on the coffee table. So much for the benefit of the doubt, hopefully Edgeworth would let them keep working here for now. Although he had a feeling he was pushing it. He had no problem working in the courthouse library, but the others had asked the prosecutors. So, he figured he might as well ask Edgeworth. They took the stairs down to the first floor where the cafeteria was. Instead of entering right away, Edgeworth stopped at the door.

Confused, Wright leaned into the door. At first he heard nothing, but he knew something had to be wrong because Edgeworth was glaring daggers at the door. Then he heard the faint sound of metal hitting metal. It was followed by cheers and “You can do it!”. He stood up straight and shrugged.

“Sounds like your guys not mine.” He turned to Edgeworth who leveled him with a glare.

“Think again,” he growled as he pushed the door open quietly.

Once they stepped inside, they were met with a cleared out space containing a fight. There was an audience as well made up of prosecutor Gavin, Trucy, Kay Faraday, and Godot who was off to the side watching and drinking coffee. They had their backs to the door and were instead watching Athena and Simon have a sword fight. Since when could Athena use a sword? Off at one of the other tables was Apollo trying to do work still, as always, and closer to the door was Sebastian Debeste. There were even some prosecutors Phoenix didn’t recognize poking their heads through the other door. They ducked out though as soon as they spotted the chief.

“Prosecutor Debeste,” Edgeworth spoke as he approached the other, “what is going on?”

“Ah!” Sebastian was startled and clamped his hand over his mouth, “Mr. Edgeworth! I uh… I’m not sure. This just didn’t seem very safe.” Edgeworth nodded and walked past him.

“It appears I was wrong to assume I didn’t need to make a rule against sword fights.” He stepped up to the group and everyone stopped. Wright swore he saw souls leave bodies once they noticed him. 

“Hi Mr.Edgeworth!” Kay cheered, she clearly had no fear of Edgeworth.

At this Apollo looked up and took an ear plug out of his ear. Noticing Wright and Edgeworth he sighed.

“Told you,” he called over to the group, returning to his work. Everyone else, minus Kay who was smiling and Godot who was snickering, hung their heads in shame. 

“I believe you all still have work to do. I hope I don’t need to respond to another call like this, if I do, there will be consequences.” He turned towards Godot, “I’d expect more of the oldest person in the room.”

“You expect better behavior from a convict then a bunch of lawyers? Geez how bad behaved are these kids?”

“He said oldest, nothing to do with whether you’re a convict or not,” Wright said from by the door. He hadn’t moved, mostly because he was still trying to figure out what he was supposed to do. As a boss and father he should scold them, he just wasn’t sure how.

They all stood in silence for a bit until Edgeworth turned and left. So he was leaving Wright to clean up? He could do that.

“Well, I’m going to look at my crime scene once more before tomorrow,” Apollo said, getting up.

“No you’re not,” Wright turned to him, “help put the tables back. Then Athena, Trucy, and you are coming to talk to me.” Then the arguing started.

“Why me?” Apollo asked.

“Well you didn’t exactly try to stop us, Polly.”

“Look at that, Trite grew a pair,” Godot started laughing and Wright frowned at him.

“Well what about the prosecutors? And Kay and Sebastian didn’t do anything to stop us!” Athena whined.

“Well I’m a thief! Not a lawyer.”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“I don’t technically work here.”

“I’m sure we'll have to face herr Edgeworth later, or he’ll just give us a bunch of paperwork.”

“This is your fault for humoring Wright-chan.”

“You agreed to have a sword fight with the Fraulein!”

“Okay everyone stop! Just clean up, Edgeworth can deal with the prosecutors and Kay. And I’m pretty sure Sebastian was the one who told the receptionist. Now hurry up so we can apologize to Edgeworth.” There was a course of whining and someone muttered snitch. “If you really don’t want to apologize that’s fine,” Wright turned and headed to the door patting Sebastian on the shoulder, “I’m sure the courthouse library won’t mind us working there for the week.”

---

Edgeworth returned to his office before Wright as he’d left his partner to pick up the mess his children had made. Although he’d never call them that out loud, he did think of them as his children. Mostly because they kept causing him trouble. Taking a seat at his desk, he opened his laptop back up and checked the weather briefly. It was supposed to rain tomorrow, but nothing too bad. He could expect his sister and daughter back that evening. Turning Back to his work, he decided if Wright wasn’t back in half an hour he’d call to make sure he was actually picking up the mess. 

We've been here so long... Still I remember the rainy September, Contact. Two, four, one, ten. Two four, one, ten. Am I transmitting? Is anyone listening? Contact.

He stopped typing and looked at his phone. She changed his ringtone for herself again, he sighed. She also knew better than to call him during work hours. Still, he picked up.

“Shouldn’t you be having dinner?” He smiled. “Oh? Couldn’t this have waited until tomorrow. I miss you too. Well try to get some sleep, you don’t want to be too tired. Are you at an airport, I thought you two were leaving later. No- don’t change the sub- Yes. I did notice, please stop changing my ringtone. Alright, I love you too. Goodbye.”

“Sky?”

Edgeworth jumped and looked up. Wright was standing in front of him with a smile on his face. So he’d managed to get everyone back to work had he?

“Yes. I’m assuming everyone went back to work?”

“Took some effort but once I said we’d have to work in the court house library if they didn’t stop, they cleaned up real quick. Your prosecutors didn’t want to incur anymore wrath so they weren’t too picky, except Godot… Why is he here again? Isn’t he still serving time.”

“Prosecutor Godot, much like prosecutor Blackquill, still has a job to do,” Edgeworth looked over at his laptop to see Wright settling back down. Wright shrugged at this. “And what’s wrong with the court house library?”

“They can’t play around as much,” Wright hummed, not looking up from his work.

“Well, let's hope the rest of this week isn’t anymore chaotic.” Really, he shouldn’t have said that.

[mybeautifulchristianjourney]

The Golden Calf

1 When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered around Aaron and said to him, “Come, make gods for us, who shall go before us; as for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.” 2 Aaron said to them, “Take off the gold rings that are on the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters and bring them to me.” 3 So all the people took off the gold rings from their ears and brought them to Aaron. 4 He took these from them, formed them in a mold, and cast an image of a calf, and they said, “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!” 5 When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it, and Aaron made a proclamation and said, “Tomorrow shall be a festival to the Lord.” 6 They rose early the next day and offered burnt offerings and brought sacrifices of well-being, and the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to revel.

7 The Lord said to Moses, “Go down at once! Your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have acted perversely; 8 they have been quick to turn aside from the way that I commanded them; they have cast for themselves an image of a calf and have worshiped it and sacrificed to it and said, ‘These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!’ ” 9 The Lord said to Moses, “I have seen this people, how stiff-necked they are. 10 Now let me alone so that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them, and of you I will make a great nation.”

11 But Moses implored the Lord his God and said, “O Lord, why does your wrath burn hot against your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? 12 Why should the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intent that he brought them out to kill them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth’? Turn from your fierce wrath; change your mind and do not bring disaster on your people. 13 Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, how you swore to them by your own self, saying to them, ‘I will multiply your descendants like the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your descendants, and they shall inherit it forever.’ ” 14 And the Lord changed his mind about the disaster that he planned to bring on his people.

15 Then Moses turned and went down from the mountain, carrying the two tablets of the covenant in his hands, tablets that were written on both sides, written on the front and on the back. 16 The tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, engraved upon the tablets. 17 When Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said to Moses, “There is a noise of war in the camp.” 18 But he said,

“It is not the sound made by victors or the sound made by losers; it is the sound of singing that I hear.”

19 As soon as he came near the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, Moses’s anger burned hot, and he threw the tablets from his hands and broke them at the foot of the mountain. 20 He took the calf that they had made, burned it with fire, ground it to powder, scattered it on the water, and made the Israelites drink it. — Exodus 32:1-20 | New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition (NRSVUE) New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. All rights reserved worldwide. Cross References: Genesis 6:11; Genesis 12:7; Genesis 24:22; Genesis 35:4; Exodus 14:11; Exodus 20:3-4; Exodus 20:23; Exodus 31:18; Exodus 33:3; Exodus 33:13; Exodus 34:1; Numbers 14:12-13; Numbers 14:15; Numbers 16:21; Numbers 25:2; Deuteronomy 7:25; Deuteronomy 9:8; Deuteronomy 9:16-17; Deuteronomy 9:26; 1 Samuel 15:11; 2 Samuel 24:16; 1 Kings 15:13; 2 Chronicles 34:4; Acts 7:40-41; Acts 7:51; 1 Corinthians 10:7; 2 Corinthians 3:3; 2 Corinthians 3:7; Hebrews 6:13

Read full chapter

What should we learn from the golden calf incident in Exodus 32?

[steddieas-shegoes]

UPDATE

Hi everyone! Just wanted to give a little update because I haven’t been posting as regularly the last few days. I’m fine! 

Had a rough day Wednesday that bled a bit into Thursday, so I didn’t feel super inspired and was really focused on Liam’s tryouts and just being super anxious about that.

BUT HE MADE THE TEAM!!!! And I did post a fundraiser thing here if you are able to help even by just sharing, that would mean the world to me. The excitement of him making the team dulled QUICK when I saw it was $3200 just to play, not even counting equipment ahahahaha.

But I am staying positive and keeping up the excitement for Liam because this is major for him. His coach from when he first started learn to play might be his coach for the travel team and she reached out to me this morning and said that her and the two guys who oversee hockey operations were really impressed with Liam’s development and that he’s always giving everything he’s got out there and after I cried about that for 15 minutes, I decided to just suck it up and make the fundraiser even though I hate, loathe, despise asking for help of any kind, especially money.

And if anyone has any ideas for making some extra money that’s not visual art related (my stick people are fantastic, but that is the extent to which I can draw), I am all ears. 

BUT ALL THAT BEING SAID!!! I am working on chapter 10 for call me sunshine and I think, though I cannot promise, it will be posted tomorrow. I hoped to have it posted today, but I do have actual work that calls me despite how much I wish it would forget my number. 

I have started on a few more requests as well, but again, kept getting distracted with anxiety and life and work. The good news is that when I finish those, there will be 3 or 4 posted really quickly. 

My summer classes don’t start until the 16th, so I SHOULD be able to get through a good portion of the requests by then. I have about 40 in my inbox, which is sooooo many and I am sooooo excited. So if you’ve sent one, I have seen it, read it, and gotten excited about it, I promise. I would have already reached out if I couldn’t get to it or didn’t feel comfortable with it, so just keep up the patience! I am still taking them through May 7th (Sunday). I try to do it first come first serve, but I do occasionally skip one and come back to it if the inspiration isn’t quite hitting. You aren’t limited to just one either, ask @zerokrox-blog how many of theirs are sitting in my inbox or have already been written (it’s probably double digits). I have been loving your ideas and the creativity you trust me with. 

And this is just a friendly reminder that if you ever see a prompt that was sent to me and YOU want to write it, DO IT. I am not a hoarder of ideas. These ideas aren’t even mine to begin with. If someone wants to see it, they deserve to see it in many ways and many interpretations. And the same goes for expanding or writing your own version of something that I write! If I had the time to make everything I write into a 100k fic I would, but I don’t, so if someone else wants to, then please just tag me in it so I can read it!

Thank you guys for all of your kind words and encouragement, especially lately ❤️

[xenomorphee3]

waiting for the next chapter 💙 can’t wait and such a bittersweet feeling bc it’s all coming to an end soon

Ah I know I'm bittersweet about it as well 💙😔 So sorry for the longer hiatus than usual. Really had to sit with this one of course, making it as close to perfect as I could, and I'm waiting for some commissioned art for it.

[I also took a week to continue editing the first story and got up through Chapter 40 for it. The remaining 41-51 of course are all 8-11k word behemoths haha]

I don't have a precise drop date planned for Chapter 39, Sunset but tomorrow is very possible depending on the art. I'd say if the art isn't ready enough by Tuesday, then I will probably drop the chapter then and make clear that there will be accompanying art soon.

Thank you all for your patience! The wait will be worth it, I promise. I think a part of me is just hanging on too. But I'm always working on it.